;  ii 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 


GIFT  OF 

Estate  of 


Jean  Howard  McDuffie 


DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWATS 


^ 


16 


DIANA  OF  THE  CR0S8WAYS 


a  Nobrf 


BY 

GEORGE  ,MEREDITH 


REVISED  EDITION 


NEW   YORK 

CHARLES    SCRIBNER'S    SONS 

1905 


COPYRIGHT,  1897,  BY 
GEORGE    MEREDITH 


.  2  5~  7  ^  / 1 


QWJ 


P5- 


INSCRIBED 

TO 

FREDERICK  POLLOCK 


"^^  "O  IT* 

OcwO 


CONTENTS 


CHAP.  PAGB 

I.    OF    DIARIES    AND    DIARISTS    TOUCHING    THE   HEROINE  1 

II.     AN    IRISH    BALL 17 

III.  THE  INTERIOR  OF  MR.  REDWORTH  AND  THE  EXTERIOR 

OF    MR.   SULLIVAN    SMITH 28 

IV.  CONTAINING    HINTS     OF    DIANA's     EXPERIENCES     AND 

OF    WHAT   THEY    LED    TO 37 

V.    CONCERNING     THE      SCRUPULOUS      GENTLEMAN     WHO 

CAME    TOO   LATE 49 

VI.     THE   COUPLE 58 

VII.     THE    CRISIS         . 06 

VIII.     IN    WHICH     IS     EXHIBITED     HOW   A     PRACTICAL     MAN 
AND  A  DIVINING  WOMAN   LEARN  TO  RESPECT  ONE 

ANOTHER 74 

IX.    SHOWS   HOW   A   POSITION   OF   DELICACY    FOR   A    LADY 
AND   GENTLEMAN   WAS   MET    IN    SIMPLE    FASHION 

WITHOUT    HURT    TO    EITHER 87 

X.     THE    CONFLICT   OF    THE    NIGHT 95 

XI.     RECOUNTS     THE     JOURNEY    IN    A     CHARIOT,    WITH     A 
CERTAIN    AMOUNT    OF     DIALOGUE,    AND    A    SMALL 

INCIDENT    ON    THE    ROAD 100 

XIL     BETWEEN    EMMA    AND    DIANA 107 

XIII.     TOUCHING    THE    FIRST    DAYS    OF    HER    PROBATION.       .       114 


viil  CONTENTS 

CHAP.  PAOB 

XIV.     GIVING     GLIMPSES     OF   DIANA   UNDER   HER   CLOUD 

BEFORE     THE     WORLD     AND     OF     HER     FURTHER 

APPRENTICESHIP 123 

XV.    INTRODUCES    THE   HON.   PERCY   DACIER     ....      136 
XVI.    TREATS   OF   A   MIDNIGHT   BELL,   AND   OF   A    SCENE 

OF   EARLY   MORNING 146 

XVII.    "THE   PRINCESS    EGERIA" 160 

XVIII.     THE   AUTHORESS 170 

XIX.     A   DRIVE    IN     SUNLIGHT     AND   A   DRIVE    IN    MOON- 
LIGHT       178 

XX.     DIANA'S  NIGHT-WATCH  IN  THE  CHAMBER  OF  DEATH      187 

XXI.     "THE   YOUNG   MINISTER    OF    STATE*' 196 

XXII.    BETWEEN   DIANA    AND    DACIER:     THE  WIND    EAST 

OVER   BLEAK    LAND 208 

XXIII.  RECORDS    A   VISIT   TO     DIANA     FROM    ONE   OF   THE 

world's  good  women 217 

XXIV.  INDICATES   A   SOUL   PREPARED   FOR   DESPERATION        226 
XXV.     ONCE   MORE    THE    CROSSWAYS    AND   A   CHANGE   OF 

TURNINGS 232 

XXVI.     IN   WHICH    A     DISAPPOINTED    LOVER     RECEIVES    A 

MULTITUDE   OF    LESSONS 241 

XXVII.    CONTAINS   MATTER    FOR   SUBSEQUENT   EXPLOSION  .       254 
XXVIII.     DIALOGUE   ROUND    THE    SUBJECT   OF    A    PORTRAIT, 
WITH     SOME     INDICATIONS    OF     THE   TASK     FOR 

DIANA 269 

XXIX.    SHOWS   THE   APPROACHES   OF  THE    POLITICAL  AND 

THE   DOMESTIC   CRISIS    IN   COMPANY     ....      281 
XXX.    IN  WHICH   THERE  IS  A  TASTE  OF  A  LITTLE  DINNER 

AND    AN    AFTERTASTE 295 

XXXL  A  CHAPTER  CONTAINING  GREAT  POLITICAL  NEWS 
AND  THEREWITH  AN  INTRUSION  OF  THE  LOVE- 
GOD         308 


CONTENTS  IX 

CHAP.  FAOa 

XXXII.    WHEREIN    WE    BEHOLD    A     GIDDY    TURN    AT    THE 

SPECTRAL   CROSSWAY8 309 

XXXIII.  EXHIBITS   THE   SPRINGING  OF  A   MINE   IN   A   NEWS- 

PAPER  ARTICLE 315 

XXXIV.  IN   WHICH    IT    IS    DARKLY    SEEN   HOW   THE    CRIM- 

INAL'S  JUDGE    MAY   BE   LOVE's   CRIMINAL      .      .       321 
XXXV.     REVEALS    HOW    THE    TRUE     HEROINE    OF    ROMANCE 

COMES   FINALLY   TO   HER   TIME   OF   TRIUMPH      .      328 
XXXVI.    18   CONCLUSIVE    AS     TO     THE    HEARTLESSNESS    OF 

WOMEN   WITH    BRAINS 337 

XXXVII.    AN     EXHIBITION     OF     SOME     CHAMPIONS     OF     THE 

STRICKEN    LADY 347 

IXXVIII.     CONVALESCENCE  OF  A  HEALTHY  MIND  DISTRAUGHT      357 
XXXIX.    OF     NATURE     WITH      ONE     OF     HER      CULTIVATED 
DAUGHTERS   AND  A  SHORT   EXCURSION  IN  ANTI- 
CLIMAX        363 

XL.    IN   WHICH  WE   SEE   NATURE   MAKING  OF  A  WOMAN 

A   MAID   AGAIN,   AND   A   THRICE   WHIMSICAL      .       374 
XLI.     CONTAINS   A   REVELATION   OF   THE   ORIGIN  OF  THE 

TIGRESS   IN   DIANA 384 

XLII.     THE   PENULTIMATE  :    SHOWING  A  FINAL   STRUGGLE 

FOR    LIBERTY  AND   RUN   INTO   HARNESS   .      .      .      392 
XLIII.    NUPTIAL  CHAPTER  ;   AND  OF  HOW  A  BARELY  WILL- 
ING   WOMAN    WAS    LED    TO    BLOOM    WITH    THE 
NUPTIAL    SENTIMENT 402 


A  lady  of  high  distinction  for  wit  and  beauty^ 
the  daughter  of  an  illustrious  Irish  House^  came 
under  the  shadow  of  a  calumny. 

It  has  latterly  been  examined  and  exposed  as 
baseless.  TJie  story  of  '"''Diana  of  the  Crossways^^ 
is  to  be  read  as  fiction. 


DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 


CHAPTER  I 

OF   DIARIES   AND    DIARISTS    TOUCHING   THE    HEROINE 

Among  the  Diaries  beginning  with  the  second  quarter  of 
our  century,  there  is  frequent  mention  of  a  lady  then  be- 
coming famous  for  her  beauty  and  her  wit :  "  an  unusual 
combination,"  in  the  deliberate  syllables  of  one  of  the 
writers,  who  is,  however,  not  disposed  to  personal  irony 
when  speaking  of  her.  It  is  otherwise  in  his  case :  and  a 
general  fling  at  the  sex  we  may  deem  pardonable,  for  doing 
as  little  harm  to  womankind  as  the  stone  of  an  urchin  cast 
upon  the  bosom  of  mother  Earth;  though  men  must  look 
some  day  to  have  it  returned  to  them,  which  is  a  certainty; 
—  and  indeed  full  surely  will  our  idle-handed  youngster 
too,  in  his  riper  season,  be  heard  complaining  of  a  strange 
assault  of  wanton  missiles,  coming  on  him  he  knows  not 
whence ;  for  we  are  all  of  us  distinctly  marked  to  get  back 
what  we  give,  even  from  the  thing  named  inanimate 
nature. 

The  "  Leaves  prom  the  Diary  of  Henry  Wilmers  " 
are  studded  with  examples  of  the  dinner-table  wit  of  the 
time,  not  always  worth  quotation  twice ;  for  smart  remarks 
have  their  measured  distances,  many  requiring  to  be  a 
brule  pourpoint,  or  within  throw  of  the  pistol,  to  make  it 
hit;  in  other  words,  the  majority  of  them  are  addressed 
directly  to  our  muscular  system,  and  they  have  no  effect 
when  we  stand  beyond  the  range.  On  the  contrary,  they 
reflect  sombrely  on  the  springs  of  hilarity  in  the  genera- 
tion preceding  us;  —  with  due  reserve  of  credit,  of  course, 

1 


2  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

to  an  animal  vivaciousness  that  seems  to  have  wanted  so 
small  an  incitement.  Our  old  yeomanry  farmers  returning 
to  their  beds  over  ferny  commons  under  bright  moonlight 
from  a  neighbour's  harvest-home,  eased  their  bubbling 
breasts  with  a  ready  roar  not  unakin  to  it.  Still  the 
promptness  to  laugh  is  an  excellent  progenitorial  founda- 
tion for  the  wit  to  come  in  a  people;  and  undoubtedly  the 
diarial  record  of  an  imputed  piece  of  wit  is  witness  to  the 
spouting  of  laughter.  This  should  comfort  us  while  we 
skim  the  sparkling  passages  of  the  "Leaves."  When  a 
nation  has  acknowledged  that  it  is  as  yet  but  in  the  fisti- 
cuff stage  of  the  art  of  condensing  our  purest  sense  to 
golden  sentences,  a  readier  appreciation  will  be  extended 
to  the  gift:  which  is  to  strike  not  the  dazzled  eyes,  the 
unanticipating  nose,  the  ribs,  the  sides,  and  stun  us,  twirl 
us,  hoodwink,  mystify,  tickle  and  twitch,  by  dexterities 
of  lingual  sparring  and  shuffling,  but  to  strike  roots  in  the 
mind,  the  Hesperides  of  good  things. 

We  shall  then  set  a  price  on  the  "unusual  combination." 
A  witty  woman  is  a  treasure ;  a  witty  Beauty  is  a  power. 
Has  she  actual  beauty,  actual  wit?  —  not  simply  a  tidal 
material  beauty  that  passes  current  any  pretty  flippancy 
or  staggering  pretentiousness?  Grant  the  combination, 
she  will  appear  a  veritable  queen  of  her  period,  fit  for 
homage ;  at  least  meriting  a  disposition  to  believe  the  best 
of  her,  in  the  teeth  of  foul  rumour;  because  the  well  of 
true  wit  is  truth  itself,  the  gathering  of  the  precious  drops 
of  right  reason,  wisdom's  lightning;  and  no  soul  possess- 
ing and  dispensing  it  can  justly  be  a  target  for  the  world, 
however  well  armed  the  world  confronting  her.  Our  tem- 
porary world,  that  Old  Credulity  and  stone-hurling  urchin 
in  one,  supposes  it  possible  for  a  woman  to  be  mentally 
active  up  to  the  point  of  spiritual  clarity  and  also  fleshly 
vile ;  a  guide  to  life  and  a  biter  at  the  fruits  of  death ;  both 
open  mind  and  hypocrite.  It  has  not  yet  been  taught  to 
appreciate  a  quality  certifying  to  sound  citizenship  as 
authoritatively  as  acres  of  land  in  fee  simple,  or  coffers  of 
bonds,  shares  and  stocks,  and  a  more  imperishable  guaran- 
tee. The  multitude  of  evil  reports  which  it  takes  for 
proof,  are  marshalled  against  her  without  question  of  the 
nature  of  the  victim,  her  temptress  beauty  being  a  suffi- 


OF   DIARIES  AND  DIARISTS  3 

ciently  presumptive  delinquent.  It  does  not  pretend  to 
know  the  whole,  or  naked  body  of  the  facts;  it  knows 
enough  for  its  fumy  dubiousness;  and  excepting  the  sen- 
timental of  men,  a  rocket-headed  horde,  ever  at  the  heels 
of  fair  faces  for  ignition,  and  up  starring  away  at  a  hint 
of  tearfulness ;  —  excepting  further  by  chance  a  solid 
champion  man,  or  some  generous  woman  capable  of  faith 
in  the  pelted  solitary  of  her  sex,  our  temporary  world 
l)lows  direct  East  on  her  shivering  person.  The  scandal 
is  warrant  for  that;  the  circumstances  of  the  scandal 
emphasize  the  warrant.  And  how  clever  she  is!  Clever- 
ness is  an  attribute  of  the  selecter  missionary  lieutenants 
of  Satan.  We  pray  to  be  defended  from  her  cleverness: 
she  flashes  bits  of  speech  that  catch  men  in  their  unguarded 
corner.  The  wary  stuff  their  ears,  the  stolid  bid  her  best 
sayings  rebound  on  her  reputation.  Nevertheless  the 
world,  as  Christian,  remembers  its  professions,  and  a  por- 
tion of  it  joins  the  burly  in  morals  by  extending  to  her  a 
rough  old  charitable  mercifulness ;  better  than  sentimental 
ointment,  but  the  heaviest  blow  she  has  to  bear,  to  a  char- 
acter swimming  for  life. 

That  the  lady  in  question  was  much  quoted,  the  Diaries 
and  Memoirs  testify.  Hearsay  as  well  as  hearing  was  at 
work  to  produce  the  abundance;  and  it  was  a  novelty  in 
England,  where  (in  company)  the  men  are  the  pointed 
talkers,  and  the  women  conversationally  fair  Circassians. 
They  are,  or  they  know  that  they  should  be ;  it  comes  to 
the  same.  Happily  our  civilization  has  not  prescribed  the 
veil  to  them.  The  mutes  have  here  and  there  a  sketch  or 
label  attached  to  their  names:  they  are  "strikingly  hand- 
some; "  they  are  "very  good-looking;"  occasionally  they 
are  noted  as  "extremely  entertaining:"  in  what  manner, 
is  inquired  by  a  curious  posterity,  that  in  so  many  matters 
is  left  unendingly  to  jump  the  empty  and  gaping  figure  of 
interrogation  over  its  own  full  stop.  Great  ladies  must 
they  be,  at  the  web  of  politics,  for  us  to  hear  them  cited 
discoursing.  Henry  Wilmers  is  not  content  to  quote  the 
beautiful  Mrs.  Warwick,  he  attempts  a  portrait.  Mrs.  War- 
wick is  "quite  Grecian."  She  might  "pose  for  a  statue." 
He  presents  her  in  carpenter's  lines,  with  a  dab  of  school- 
box  colours,  effective  to  those  whom  the  Keepsake  fashion 


4  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWATS 

can  stir.  She  has  a  straight  nose,  red  lips,  raven  hair, 
black  eyes,  rich  complexion,  a  remarkably  fine  bust,  and 
she  walks  well,  and  has  an  agreeable  voice;  likewise  "deli- 
cate extremities."  The  writer  was  created  for  popularity, 
had  he  chosen  to  bring  his  art  into  our  literary  market. 

Perry  Wilkinson  is  not  so  elaborate :  he  describes  her  in 
his  "  Recollections  "  as  a  splendid  brune,  eclipsing  all  the 
blondes  coming  near  her :  and  "  what  is  more,  the  beautiful 
creature  can  talk."  He  wondered,  for  she  was  young,  new 
to  society.  Subsequently  he  is  rather  ashamed  of  his  won- 
derment, and  accounts  for  it  by  "not  having  known  she 
was  Irish."    She  "turns  out  to  be  Dan  Merion's  daughter." 

We  may  assume  that  he  would  have  heard  if  she  had 
any  whiff  of  a  brogue.  Her  sounding  of  the  letter  R  a 
trifle  scrupulously  is  noticed  by  Lady  Pennon :  "  And  last, 
not  least,  the  lovely  Mrs.  Warwick,  twenty  minutes  be- 
hind the  dinner-hour,  and  r-r-really  fearing  she  was  late." 
After  alluding  to  the  soft  influence  of  her  beauty  and 
ingenuousness  on  the  vexed  hostess,  the  kindly  old  mar- 
chioness adds,  that  it  was  no  wonder  she  was  late,  "for 
just  before  starting  from  home  she  had  broken  loose  from 
her  husband  for  good,  and  she  entered  the  room  absolutely 
houseless !  "  She  was  not  the  less  "  astonishingly  brilliant." 
Her  observations  were  often  "  so  unexpectedly  droll  I 
laughed  till  I  cried."  Lady  Pennon  became  in  consequence 
one  of  the  stanch  supporters  of  Mrs.  Warwick. 

Others  were  not  so  easily  won.  Perry  Wilkinson  holds 
a  balance  when  it  goes  beyond  a  question  of  her  wit  and 
beauty.  Henry  Wilmers  puts  the  case  aside,  and  takes 
her  as  he  finds  her.  His  cousin,  the  clever  and  cynical 
Dorset  Wilmers,  whose  method  of  conveying  his  opinions 
without  stating  them  was  famous,  repeats  on  two  occasions 
when  her  name  appears  in  his  pages,  "handsome,  lively, 
witty,"  and  the  stressed  repetition  of  calculated  brevity 
while  a  fiery  scandal  was  abroad  concerning  the  lady, 
implies  weighty  substance  —  the  reservation  of  a  con- 
stable's truncheon,  that  could  legally  have  knocked  her 
character  down  to  the  pavement.  We  have  not  to  ask 
what  he  judged.  But  Dorset  Wilmers  was  a  political 
opponent  of  the  eminent  Peer  who  yields  the  second  name 
to  the  scandal,  and  politics  in  his  day  flushed  the  con- 


OF  DIARIES  AND  DIARISTS  6 

ceptions  of  men.  His  short  references  to  "that  Warwick- 
Dannisburgh  affair  "  are  not  verbally  malicious.  He  gets 
wind  of  the  terms  of  Lord  Dannisburgh's  will  and  testa- 
ment, noting  them  without  comment.  The  oddness  of  the 
instrument  in  one  respect  may  have  served  his  turn;  we 
have  no  grounds  for  thinking  him  malignant.  The  death 
of  his  enemy  closes  his  allusions  to  Mrs.  Warwick.  He 
was  growing  ancient,  and  gout  narrowed  the  circle  he 
whirled  in.  Had  he  known  this  "  handsome,  lively,  witty  " 
apparition  as  a  woman  having  political  and  social  views  of 
her  own,  he  would  not,  one  fancies,  have  been  so  stingless. 
Our  England  exposes  a  sorry  figure  in  his  Reminiscences. 
He  struck  heavily,  round  and  about  him,  wherever  he 
moved;  he  had  by  nature  a  tarnishing  eye  that  cast  dis- 
colouration. His  unadorned  harsh  substantive  statements, 
excluding  the  adjectives,  give  his  Memoirs  the  appearance 
of  a  body  of  facts,  attractive  to  the  historic  Muse,  which 
has  learnt  to  esteem  those  brawny  sturdy  giants  marching 
club  on  shoulder,  independent  of  henchman,  in  preference 
to  your  panoplied  knights  with  their  puffy  squires,  once 
her  favourites,  and  wind-filling  to  her  columns,  ultimately 
found  indigestible. 

His  exhibition  of  his  enemy  Lord  Dannisburgh  is  of  the 
class  of  noble  portraits  we  see  swinging  over  inn-portals, 
grossly  unlike  in  likeness.  The  possibility  of  the  man^s 
doing  or  saying  this  and  that  adumbrates  the  improbability : 
he  had  something  of  the  character  capable  of  it,  too  much 
good  sense  for  the  performance.  We  would  think  so,  and 
still  the  shadow  is  round  our  thoughts.  Lord  Dannis- 
burgh was  a  man  of  ministerial  tact,  official  ability.  Pagan 
morality;  an  excellent  general  manager,  if  no  genius  in 
statecraft.  But  he  was  careless  of  social  opinion,  unbut- 
toned, and  a  laugher.  We  know  that  he  could  be  chival- 
rous toward  women,  notwithstanding  the  perplexities  he 
brought  on  them,  and  this  the  Dorset-Diary  does  not 
show. 

His  chronicle  is  less  mischievous  as  regards  Mrs.  Warwick 
than  the  paragraphs  of  Perry  Wilkinson,  a  gossip  present- 
ing an  image  of  perpetual  chatter,  like  the  waxen-faced 
street  advertizements  of  light  and  easy  dentistry.  He  has 
no  belief,  no  disbelief;  names  the  pro-party  and  the  con; 


6  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

recites  the  case,  and  discreetly,  over-discreetly;  and  pic- 
tures the  trial,  tells  the  list  of  witnesses,  records  the  ver- 
dict: so  the  case  went,  and  some  thought  one  thing,  some 
another  thing:  only  it  is  reported  for  positive  that  a  min- 
iature of  the  incriminated  lady  was  cleverly  smuggled  over 
to  the  jury,  and  juries  sitting  upon  these  cases,  ever  since 
their  bedazzlement  by  Phryne,  as  you  know.  .  .  .  And 
then  he  relates  an  anecdote  of  the  husband,  said  to  have 
been  not  a  bad  fellow  before  he  married  his  Diana;  —  and 
the  naming  of  the  Goddess  reminds  him  that  the  second 
person  in  the  indictment  is  now  everywhere  called  '  The 
elderly  shepherd;'  — but  immediately  after  the  bridal  bells 
this  husband  became  sour  and  insupportable;  and  either 
she  had  the  trick  of  putting  him  publicly  in  the  wrong,  or 
he  lost  all  shame  in  playing  the  churlish  domestic  tyrant. 
The  instances  are  incredible  of  a  gentleman.  Perry  Wil- 
kinson gives  us  two  or  three ;  one  on  the  authority  of  a 
personal  friend  who  witnessed  the  scene;  at  the  Warwick 
whist-table,  where  the  fair  Diana  would  let  loose  her  sil- 
very laugh  in  the  intervals.  She  was  hardly  out  of  her 
teens,  and  should  have  been  dancing  instead  of  fastened  to 
a  table.  A  difference  of  fifteen  years  in  the  ages  of  the 
wedded  pair  accounts  poorly  for  the  husband's  conduct, 
however  solemn  a  business  the  game  of  whist.  We  read 
that  he  burst  out  at  last,  with  bitter  mimicry,  "yang  — 
yang  —  yang !  "  and  killed  the  bright  laugh,  shot  it  dead. 
She  had  outraged  the  decorum  of  the  square-table  only 
while  the  cards  were  making.  Perhaps  her  too-dead  ensu- 
ing silence,  as  of  one  striving  to  bring  back  the  throbs  to 
a  slain  bird  in  her  bosom,  allowed  the  gap  between  the 
wedded  pair  to  be  visible,  for  it  was  dated  back  to  prophecy 
as  soon  as  the  trumpet  proclaimed  it. 

But  a  multiplication  of  similar  instances,  which  can 
serve  no  other  purpose  than  that  of  an  apology,  is  a  mis- 
erable vindication  of  innocence.  The  more  we  have  of 
them  the  darker  the  inference.  In  delicate  situations  the 
chatterer  is  noxious.  Mrs.  Warwick  had  numerous  apol- 
ogists. Those  trusting  to  her  perfect  rectitude  were  rarer. 
The  liberty  she  allowed  herself  in  speech  and  action  must 
have  been  trying  to  her  defenders  in  a  land  like  ours ;  for 
here,  and  able  to  throw  its  shadow  on  our  giddy  upper- 


OF  DIARIES  AND  DIARISTS  7 

circle,  the  rigour  of  the  game  of  life,  relaxed  though  it 
may  sometimes  appear,  would  satisfy  the  staidest  whist- 
player.  She  did  not  wish  it  the  reverse,  even  when  claim- 
ing a  space  for  laughter :  "  the  breath  of  her  soul ,"  as  she 
called  it,  and  as  it  may  be  felt  in  the  early  youth  of  a 
lively  nature.  She,  especially,  with  her  multitude  of 
quick  perceptions  and  imaginative  avenues,  her  rapid  sum- 
maries, her  sense  of  the  comic,  demanded  this  aerial 
freedom. 

We  have  it  from  Perry  Wilkinson  that  the  union  of  the 
divergent  couple  was  likened  to  another  union  always  in  a 
Court  of  Law.  There  was  a  distinction;  most  analogies 
will  furnish  one;  and  here  we  see  England  and  Ireland 
changing  their  parts,  until  later,  after  the  breach,  when 
the  Englishman  and  Irishwoman  resumed  a  certain  resem- 
blance to  the  yoked  Islands. 

Henry  Wilmers,  I  have  said,  deals  exclusively  with 
the  wit  and  charm  of  the  woman.  He  treats  the  scandal 
as  we  might  do  in  like  manner  if  her  story  had  not  to  be 
told.  But  these  are  not  reporting  columns;  very  little  of 
it  shall  trouble  them.  The  position  is  faced,  and  that  is 
all.  The  position  is  one  of  the  battles  incident  to  women, 
their  hardest.  It  asks  for  more  than  justice  from  men,  for 
generosity,  our  civilization  not  being  yet  of  the  purest. 
That  cry  of  hounds  at  her  disrobing  by  Law  is  instinctive. 
She  runs,  and  they  give  tongue;  she  is  a  creature  of  the 
chase.  Let  her  escape  unmangled,  it  will  pass  in  the 
record  that  she  did  once  publicly  run,  and  some  old  dogs 
will  persist  in  thinking  her  cunninger  than  the  virtuous, 
which  never  put  themselves  in  such  positions,  but  ply  the 
distaff  at  home.  Never  should  reputation  of  woman  trail 
a  scent !  How  true !  and  true  also  that  the  women  of  wax- 
work never  do;  and  that  the  women  of  happy  marriages 
do  not;  nor  the  women  of  holy  nunneries;  nor  the  women 
lucky  in  their  arts.  It  is  a  test  of  the  civilized  to  see  and 
hear,  and  add  no  yapping  to  the  spectacle. 

Thousands  have  reflected  on  a  Diarist's  power  to  cancel 
our  Burial  Service.  Not  alone  the  cleric^s  good  work  is 
upset  by  him,  but  the  sexton's  as  well.  He  howks  the 
graves,  and  transforms  the  quiet  worms,  busy  on  a  single 
poor  peaceable  body,  into  winged  serpents  that  disorder 


8  DIANA  OP  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

Bky  and  earth  with  a  deadly  flight  of  zig-zags,  like  mili- 
tary rockets,  among  the  living.  And  if  these  are  given  to 
cry  too  much,  to  have  their  tender  sentiments  considered, 
it  cannot  be  said  that  History  requires  the  flaying  of  them. 
A  gouty  Diarist,  a  sheer  gossip  Diarist,  may  thus,  in  the 
bequest  of  a  trail  of  reminiscences,  explode  our  temples 
(for  our  very  temples  have  powder  in  store),  our  treasuries, 
our  homesteads,  alive  with  dynamitic  stuff;  nay,  discon- 
cert our  inherited  veneration,  dislocate  the  intimate  con- 
nexion between  the  tugged  flaxen  forelock  and  a  title. 

No  similar  blame  is  incurred  by  Henry  Wilmers,  No 
blame  whatever,  one  would  say,  if  he  had  been  less  copious, 
or  not  so  subservient,  in  recording  the  lady's  utterances; 
for  though  the  wit  of  a  woman  may  be  terse,  quite  spon- 
taneous, as  this  lady's  assuredly  was  here  and  there,  she 
is  apt  to  spin  it  out  of  a  museful  mind,  at  her  toilette,  or 
by  the  lonely  fire,  and  sometimes  it  is  imitative;  admirers 
should  beware  of  holding  it  up  to  the  withering  glare  of 
print:  she  herself,  quoting  an  obscure  maxim-monger,  says 
of  these  lapidary  sentences,  that  they  have  merely  ^^the 
value  of  chalk-eggs^  which  lure  the  thinker  to  sit^^  and  tempt 
the  vacuous  to  strain  for  the  like,  one  might  add;  besides 
flattering  the  world  to  imagine  itself  richer  than  it  is  in 
eggs  that  are  golden.  Henry  Wilmers  notes  a  multitude 
of  them.  "  The  talk  fell  upon  our  being  creatures  of  habit, 
and  how  far  it  was  good:  She  said:  —  It  is  there  that  we 
see  ourselves  crutched  between  love  grown  old  and  indif- 
ference ageing  to  love."  Critic  ears  not  present  at  the 
conversation  catch  an  echo  of  maxims  and  aphorisms  over- 
channel,  notwithstanding  a  feminine  thrill  in  the  irony  of 
"ageing  to  love."  The  quotation  ranks  rather  among  the 
testimonies  to  her  charm. 

She  is  fresher  when  speaking  of  the  war  of  the  sexes. 
For  one  sentence  out  of  many,  though  we  find  it  to  be  but 
the  clever  literary  clothing  of  a  common  accusation :  — 
"  Men  may  have  rounded  Seraglio  Point :  they  have  not  yet 
doubled  Cape  TurkJ^ 

It  is  war,  and  on  the  male  side,  Ottoman  war;  her 
experience  reduced  her  to  think  so  positively.  Her  main 
personal  experience  was  in  the  social  class  which  is  prim- 
itively venatorial  still,  canine  under  its  polish. 


OF  DIARIES  AND  DIARISTS  9 

She  held  a  brief  for  her  beloved  Ireland.  She  closes  a 
discussion  upon  Irish  agitation  by  saying  rather  neatl}^: 
"  You  have  taught  them  it  is  English  as  well  as  common 
human  nature  to  feel  an  interest  in  the  dog  that  has  bitten 
you.^^ 

The  dog  periodically  puts  on  madness  to  win  attention; 
we  gather  then  that  England,  in  an  angry  tremour,  tries 
him  with  water-gruel  to  prove  him  sane. 

Of  the  Irish  priest  (and  she  was  not  of  his  retinue), 
when  he  was  deemed  a  revolutionary,  Henry  Wilmers  notes 
her  saying:  "Be  in  tune  with  him;  he  is  in  the  key-note 
for  harmony.  He  is  shepherd,  doctor,  nurse,  comforter, 
anecdotist  and  fun-maker  to  his  poor  flock;  and  you  won- 
der they  see  the  burning  gateway  of  their  heaven  in  him? 
Conciliate  the  priest." 

It  has  been  partly  done,  done  late,  when  the  poor  flock 
have  found  their  doctoring  and  shepherding  at  other  hands: 
their  "bulb-food  and  fiddle,"  that  she  petitioned  for,  to  keep 
them  from  a  complete  shaving  off  their  patch  of  bog  and 
scrub  soil,  without  any  perception  of  the  tremendous  trans- 
atlantic magnification  of  the  fiddle,  and  the  splitting  dis- 
cord of  its  latest  inspiriting  jig. 

And  she  will  not  have  the  consequences  of  the  "  weariful 
old  Irish  duel  between  Honour  and  Hunger  judged  by 
bread  and  butter  juries." 

She  had  need  to  be  beautiful  to  be  tolerable  in  days 
when  Englishmen  stood  more  openly  for  the  strong  arm  to 
maintain  the  Union.  Her  troop  of  enemies  was  of  her 
summoning. 

Ordinarily  her  topics  were  of  wider  range,  and  those  of 
a  woman  who  mixed  hearing  with  reading,  and  obser- 
vation with  her  musings.  She  has  no  doleful  ejaculatory 
notes,  of  the  kind  peculiar  to  women  at  war,  containing 
one-third  of  speculative  substance  to  two  of  sentimental 

—  a  feminine  plea  for  comprehension  and  a  squire ;  and  it 
was  probably  the  reason  (as  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose 
an  emotional  cause)  why  she  exercised  her  evident  sway 
over  the  mind  of  so  plain  and  straightforward  an  English- 
man as  Henry  Wilmers.  She  told  him  that  she  read 
rapidly,  "a  great  deal  at  one  gulp,"  and  thought  in  flashes 

—  a  way  with  the  makers  of  phrases.     She  wrote,  she  con- 


10  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

fessed,  laboriously.  The  desire  to  prune,  compress,  over- 
charge, was  a  torment  to  the  nervous  woman  writing  under 
a  sharp  necessity  for  payment.  Her  songs  were  shot  off 
on  the  impulsion;  prose  was  the  heavy  task.  "To  be 
pointedly  rational,"  she  said,  "is  a  greater  difficulty  for 
me  than  a  fine  delirium."  She  did  not  talk  as  if  it  would 
have  been  so,  he  remarks.  One  is  not  astonished  at  her 
appearing  an  "actress"  to  the  flat-minded.  But  the  basis 
of  her  woman's  nature  was  pointed  flame.  In  the  fulness 
of  her  history  we  perceive  nothing  histrionic.  Capricious 
or  enthusiastic  in  her  youth,  she  never  trifled  with  feel- 
ing; and  if  she  did  so  with  some  showy  phrases  and  occa- 
sionally proffered  commonplaces  in  gilt,  as  she  was  much 
excited  to  do,  her  moods  of  reflection  were  direct,  always 
large  and  honest,  universal  as  well  as  feminine. 

Her  saying  that  "A  woman  in  the  pillory  restores  the 
original  bark  of  brotherhood  to  mankind,"  is  no  more  than 
a  cry  of  personal  anguish.  She  has  golden  apples  in  her 
apron.  She  says  of  life:  "  When  I  fail  to  cherish  it  in 
every  fibre  the  fires  within  are  waning j^^  and  that  drives 
like  rain  to  the  roots.  She  says  of  the  world,  generously, 
if  with  tapering  idea:  "From  the  point  of  vision  of  the 
angels,  this  ugly  monster,  only  half  out  of  slime,  must 
appear  our  one  constant  hero." 

It  can  be  read  maliciously,  but  abstain. 

She  says  of  Romance :  *'  The  young  who  avoid  that  region 
escape  the  title  of  Fool  at  the  cost  of  a  celestial  crown. "  Of 
Poetry :  "  Those  that  have  souls  meet  their  fellows  there^ 

But  she  would  have  us  away  with  sentimentalism.  Sen- 
timental people,  in  her  phrase,  '^fiddle  harmonics  on  the 
strings  of  sensualism,^'  to  the  delight  of  a  world  gaping 
for  marvels  of  musical  execution  rather  than  for  music. 
For  our  world  is  all  but  a  sensational  world  at  present,  in 
maternal  travail  of  a  soberer,  a  braver,  a  brighter-eyed. 
Her  reflections  are  thus  to  be  interpreted,  it  seems  to  me. 
She  says,  "The  vices  of  the  world's  nobler  half  in  this  day 
are  feminine."  We  have  to  guard  against  "  half -conceptions 
of  wisdom,  hysterical  goodness,  an  impatient  charity  "  — 
against  the  elementary  state  of  the  altruistic  virtues,  dis- 
tinguishable as  the  sickness  and  writhings  of  our  egoism  to 
cast  its  first  slough.     Idea  is  there.     The  funny  part  of  it 


OF  DIARIES  AND  DIARISTS  ll 

is  our  finding  it  in  books  of  fiction  composed  for  payment. 
Manifestly  this  lady  did  not  "chameleon"  her  pen  from 
the  colour  of  her  audience :  she  was  not  of  the  uniformed 
rank  and  file  marching  to  drum  and  fife  as  gallant  inter- 
preters of  popular  appetite,  and  going  or  gone  to  sound- 
lessness  arid  the  icy  shades. 

Touches  inward  are  not  absent:  "To  have  the  sense  of 
the  eternal  in  life  is  a  short  flight  for  the  soul.  To  have 
had  it,  is  the  soul's  vitality." 

And  also :  "  Palliation  of  a  sin  is  the  hunted  creature's 
refuge  and  final  temptation.  Our  battle  is  ever  between 
spirit  and  flesh.  Spirit  must  brand  the  flesh,  that  it  may 
live." 

You  are  entreated  to  repress  alarm.  She  was  by  prefer- 
ence light-handed;  and  her  saying  of  oratory,  that  '' It  is 
always  the  more  impressive  for  the  spice  of  temper  which 
renders  it  untrustworthy,^^  is  light  enough. 

On  Politics  she  is  rhetorical  and  swings :  she  wrote  to 
spur  a  junior  politician :  "  It  is  the  first  business  of  men, 
the  school  to  mediocrity,  to  the  covetously  ambitious  a 
sty,  to  the  dullard  his  amphitheatre,  arms  of  Titans  to  the 
desperately  enterprising,  Olympus  to  the  genius." 

What  a  woman  thinks  of  women,  is  the  test  of  her 
nature.  She  saw  their  existing  posture  clearly,  yet  be- 
lieved, as  men  disincline  to  do,  that  they  grow.  She  says 
that  "  In  their  judgements  upon  women  men  are  females, 
voices  of  the  present  (sexual)  dilemma,"  They  desire  to 
have  "  a  still  woman,  who  can  make  a  constant  society  of 
her  pins  and  needles."  They  create  by  stoppage  a  volcano, 
and  are  amazed  at  its  eruptiveness.  "  We  live  alone,  and 
do  not  much  feel  it  till  we  are  visited."  Love  is  presume- 
ably  the  visitor.  Of  the  greater  loneliness  of  women,  she 
says:  "It  is  due  to  the  prescribed  circumscription  of  their 
minds,  of  which  they  become  aware  in  agitation.  Were 
the  walls  about  them  beaten  down,  they  would  understand 
that  solitariness  is  a  common  human  fate  and  the  one 
chance  of  growth,  like  space  for  timber."  As  to  the  sen- 
sations of  women  after  the  beating  down  of  the  walls,  she 
owns  that  the  multitude  of  the  timorous  would  yearn  in 
shivering  affright  for  the  old  prison-nest,  according  to  the 
sage  prognostic  of  men;   but  the  flying  of  a  valiant  few 


12  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

would  form  a  vanguard.  And  we  are  informed  that  the 
beginning  of  a  motive  life  with  women  must  be  in  the 
head,  equally  with  men  (by  no  means  a  truism  when  she 
wrote).  Also  that  "men  do  not  so  much  fear  to  lose  the 
hearts  of  thoughtful  women  as  their  strict  attention  to 
their  graces.'^  The  present  market  is  what  men  are  for 
preserving:  an  observation  of  still  reverberating  force. 
Generally  in  her  character  of  the  feminine  combatant  there 
is  a  turn  of  phrase,  like  a  dimple  near  the  lips,  showing 
her  knowledge  that  she  was  uttering  but  a  tart  measure  of 
the  truth.  She  had  always  too  much  lambent  humour  to 
be  the  dupe  of  the  passion  wherewith,  as  she  says,  "  we 
lash  ourselves  into  the  persuasive  speech  distinguishing 
us  from  the  animals." 

The  instances  of  her  drollery  are  rather  hinted  by  the 
Diarists  for  the  benefit  of  those  who  had  met  her  and  could 
inhale  the  atmosphere  at  a  word.  Drolleries,  humours, 
reputed  witticisms,  are  like  odours  of  roast  meats,  past 
with  the  picking  of  the  joint.  Idea  is  the  only  vital 
breath.  They  have  it  rarely,  or  it  eludes  the  chronicler. 
To  say  of  the  great  erratic  and  forsaken  Lady  A^^^^,  after 
she  had  accepted  the  consolations  of  Bacchus,  that  her 
name  was  properly  signified  in  asterisks ;  *'  as  she  was  now 
nightly  an  Ariadne  in  heaven  through  her  God,"  sounds  to 
us  a  roundabout,  with  wit  somewhere  and  fun  nowhere. 
Sitting  at  the  roast  we  might  have  thought  differently. 
Perry  Wilkinson  is  not  happier  in  citing  her  reply  to  his 
compliment  on  the  reviewers'  unanimous  eulogy  of  her 
humour  and  pathos :  —  the  "  merry  clown  and  poor  panta- 
loon demanded  of  us  in  every  work  of  fiction,"  she  says, 
lamenting  the  writer's  compulsion  to  go  on  producing  them 
for  applause  until  it  is  extremest  age  that  knocks  their 
knees.  We  are  informed  by  Lady  Pennon  of  "the  most 
amusing  description  of  the  first  impressions  of  a  pretty 
English  simpleton  in  Paris ; "  and  here  is  an  opportunity 
for  ludicrous  contrast  of  the  Prench  and  English  styles  of 
pushing  flatteries  —  "piping  to  the  charmed  animal,"  as 
Mrs.  Warwick  terms  it  in  another  place :  but  Lady  Pennon 
was  acquainted  with  the  silly  woman  of  the  piece,  and 
found  her  amusement  in  the  "  wonderful  truth  "  of  that 
representation. 


OF  DIARIES  AND   DIARISTS  13 

Diarists  of  amusing  passages  are  under  an  obligation 
to  paint  us  a  realistic  revival  of  the  time,  or  we  miss  the 
relish.  The  odour  of  the  roast,  and  more,  a  slice  of  it  is 
required,  unless  the  humorous  thing  be  preternaturally 
spirited  to  walk  the  earth  as  one  immortal  among  a  num- 
ber less  numerous  than  the  mythic  Gods.  "  He  gives  good 
dinners,"  a  candid  old  critic  said,  when  asked  how  it  was 
that  he  could  praise  a  certain  poet.  In  an  island  of  chills 
and  fogs,  caelum  crebris  imbribus  ac  nebulis  foedum,  the 
comic  and  other  perceptions  are  dependent  on  the  stirring 
of  the  gastric  juices.  And  such  a  revival  by  any  of  us 
would  be  impolitic,  were  it  a  possible  attempt,  before  our 
systems  shall  have  been  fortified  by  philosophy.  Then 
may  it  be  allowed  to  the  Diarist  simply  to  relate,  and  we 
can  copy  from  him. 

Then,  ah!  then,  moreover,  will  thejaQxaList's  Art,  now 
neither  blushless  infant  nor  exeTJ'u^Tve  man,  have  attained 
its  majority.  We  can  then  be  veraciously  historical, 
honestly  transcriptive.  Rose-pink  and  dirty  drab  will 
alike  have  passed  away,  philosophy  is  the  foe  of  both, 
and  their  silly  cancelling  contest,  perpetually  renewed  in 
a  shuffle  of  extremes,  as  it  always  is  where  a  phantasm 
falseness  reigns,  will  no  longer  baffle  the  contemplation  of 
natural  flesh,  smother  no  longer  the  soul  issuing  out  of  our 
incessant  strife.  Philosophy  bids  us  to  see  that  we  are 
not  so  pretty  as  rose-pink,  not  so  repulsive  as  dirty  drab; 
and  that  instead  of  everlastingly  shifting  those  barren 
aspects,  the  sight  of  ourselves  is  wholesome,  bearable, 
fructifying,  finally  a  delight.  Do  but  perceive  that  we  are 
coming  to  philosophy,  the  stride  toward  it  will  be  a  giant's 

—  a  century  a  day.  And  imagine  the  celestial  refresh- 
ment of  having  a  pure  decency  in  the  place  of  sham ;  real 
flesh;  a  soul  born  active,  wind-beaten,  but  ascending. 
Honourable  will  fiction  then  appear;  honourable,  a  fount 
of  life,  an  aid  to  life,  quick  with  our  blood.  Why,  when 
you  behold  it  you  love  it  —  and  you  will  not  encourage  it? 

—  or  only  when  presented  by  dead  hands?  Worse  than 
that  alternative  dirty  drab,  your  recurring  rose-pink  is 
rebuked  by  hideous  revelations  of  the  filthy  foul;  for 
nature  will  force  her  way,  and  if  you  try  to  stifle  her  by 
drowning,  she  comes  up,  not  the  fairest  part  of  her  upper- 


14  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

most !  Peruse  your  Eealists  ^-  really  your  castigators  for 
not  having  yet  embraced  Philosophy.  As  she  grows  in 
the  flesh  when  discreetly  tended,  nature  is  unimpeachable, 
flower-like,  yet  not  too  decoratively  a  flower;  you  must 
have  her  with  the  stem,  the  thorns,  the  roots,  and  the  fat 
bedding  of  roses.  In  this  fashion  she  grew,  says  histor- 
ical fiction;  thus  does  she  flourish  now,  would  say  the 
modern  transcript,  reading  the  inner  as  well  as  exhibiting 
the  outer. 

And  how  may  you  know  that  you  have  reached  to  Phi-^ 
losophy?  You  touch  her  skirts  when  you  share  her  hatred 
of  the  sham  decent,  her  derision  of  sentimentalism.  You 
are  one  with  her  when  —  but  I  would  not  have  you  a  thou- 
sand years  older!  Get  to  her,  if  in  no  other  way,  by  the 
sentimental  route:  —  that  very  winding  path,  w^hich  again 
and  again  brings  you  round  to  the  point  of  original  impetus, 
where  you  have  to  be  unwound  for  another  whirl;  your 
point  of  original  impetus  being  the  grossly  material,  not 
at  all  the  spiritual.  It  is  most  true  that  sentimentalism 
springs  from  the  former,  merely  and  badly  aping  the  latter; 
—  fine  flower,  or  pinnacle  flame-spire,  of  sensualism  that 
it  is,  could  it  do  other?  —  and  accompanying  the  former  it 
traverses  tracts  of  desert,  here  and  there  couching  in  a 
garden,  catching  with  one  hand  at  fruits,  with  another  at 
colours;  imagining  a  secret  ahead,  and  goaded  by  an  appe- 
tite, sustained  by  sheer  gratifications.  Fiddle  in  har- 
monics as  it  may,  it  will  have  these  gratifications  at  all 
costs.  Should  none  be  discoverable,  at  once  you  are  at 
the  Cave  of  Despair,  beneath  the  funereal  orb  of  Glaucoma, 
in  the  thick  midst  of  poniarded,  slit-throat,  rope-dependent 
figures,  placarded  across  the  bosom  Disillusioned,  Infidel, 
Agnostic,  Miserrimus.  That  is  the  sentimental  route  to 
advancement.  Spirituality  does  not  light  it;  evanescent 
dreams  are  its  oil-lamps,  often  with  wick  askant  in  the 
eocket. 

A  thousand  years!  You  may  count  full  many  a  thou- 
sand by  this  route  before  you  are  one  with  divine  Philos- 
ophy. Whereas  a  single  flight  of  brains  will  reach  and 
embrace  her;  give  you  the  savour  of  Truth,  the  right  use 
of  the  senses,  Eeality's  infinite  sweetness;  for  these  things 
e,re  in  philosophy;  and  the  fiction  which  is  the  summary 


OF  DIARIES   AND  DIARISTS  15 

of  actual  Life,  the  within  and  without  of  us,  is,  prose  or 
verse,  plodding  or  soaring,  philosophy's  elect  handmaiden. 
To  such  an  end  let  us  bend  our  aim  to  work,  knowing  that 
every  form  of  labour,  even  this  flimsiest,  as  you  esteem  it, 
should  minister  to  growth.     If  in  any  branch  of  us  we  fail 
in  growth,  there  is,  you  are  aware,  an  unfailing  aboriginal 
democratic  old  monster  that  waits  to  pull  us  down;  cer- 
tainly the  branch,  possibly  the  tree ;  and  for  the  welfare 
of  Life  we  fall.     You  are  acutely  conscious  of  yonder  old 
monster  when  he  is  mouthing  at  you  in  politics.     Be  wary 
of  him  in  the  heart;  especially  be  wary  of  the  disrelish  of 
brainstuff.     You  must  feed  on  something.     Matter  that  is 
not  nourishing  to  brains  can  help  to  constitute  nothing  but 
the  bodies  which  are  pitched  on  rubbish  heaps.     Brainstuff 
is  not  lean  stuff;  the  brainstuff  of  fiction  is  internal  his- 
tory, and  to  suppose  it  dull  is  the  profoundest  of  errors ; 
how  deep,  you  will  understand  when  I  tell  you  that  it  is 
the  very  football  of  the   holiday-afternoon  imps  below. 
They  kick  it  for  pastime;  they  are  intelligences  perverted. 
The  comic  of  it,  the  adventurous,  the  tragic,  they  make 
devilish,  to  kindle  their  Ogygian  hilarity.     But  sharply 
comic,  adventurous,  instructively  tragic,  it  is  in  the  inter- 
winding  with  human  affairs,  to  give  a  flavour  of  the  modern 
day  reviving  that  of  our  Poet,  between  whom  and  us  yawn 
Time's  most  hollow  jaws.     Surely  we  owe  a  little  to  Time, 
to   cheer  his  progress;  a  little  to   posterity,  and  to  our 
country.     Dozens  of  writers  will  be  in  at  yonder  yawn- 
ing breach,  if  only  perusers  will  rally  to  the  philosophic 
standard.     They  are  sick  of  the  woodeny  puppetry  they 
dispense,    as   on  a   race-course   to  the   roaring  frivolous. 
Well,  if  not  dozens,  half-dozens;  gallant  pens  are  alive; 
one  can  speak  of  them  in  the  plural.     I  venture  to  say  that 
they  would  be  satisfied  with  a  dozen  for  audience,  for  a 
commencement.     They  would  perish  of  inanition,  unfed, 
unapplauded,  amenable  to  the  laws  perchance  for  an  assault 
on  their  last  remaining  pair  of  ears  or  heels,  to  hold  them 
fast.     But  the  example  is  the  thing;   sacrifices  must  be 
expected.     The  example  might,  one  hopes,  create  a  taste. 
A  great  modern  writer,  of  clearest  eye  and  head,  now  de- 
parted, capable  in  activity  of  presenting  thoughtful  women, 
thinking  men,  groaned  over  his  puppetry,  that  he  dared 


16  DIANA  OP  THE  CROSS"WATS 

not  animate  them,  flesh  though  they  were,  with  the  fii 
of  positive  brainstuff.  He  could  have  done  it,  and  he 
of  the  departed!  Had  he  dared,  he  would  (for  he  w 
Titan  enough)  have  raised  the  Art  in  dignity  on  a  le^^ 
with  History,  to  an  interest  surpassing  the  narrative 
public  deeds  as  vividly  as  man's  heart  and  brain 
their  union  excel  his  plain  lines  of  action  to  eruptic 
The  everlasting  pantomime,  suggested  by  Mrs.  Warwi 
in  her  exclamation  to  Perry  Wilkinson,  is  derided,  e 
unrighteously,  by  our  graver  seniors.  They  name  tl 
;  Art  the  pasture  of  idiots,  a  method  for  idiotizing  the  enti 
^population  which  has  taken  to  reading;  and  which  so^ 
discovers  that  it  can  write  likewise,  that  sort  of  stuff 
least.  The  forecast  may  be  hazarded,  that  if  we  do  e 
speedily  embrace  Philosophy  in  fiction,  the  Art  is  doom 
to  extinction,  under  the  shining  multitude  of  its  prof( 
sors.  They  are  fast  capping  the  candle.  Instead,  thei 
fore,  of  objurgating  the  timid  intrusions  of  Philosoph 
invoke  her  presence,  I  pray  you.  History  without  her 
the  skeleton  map  of  events:  Fiction  a  picture  of  figur 
modelled  on  no  skeleton-anatomy.  But  each,  with  Philos 
phy  in  aid,  blooms,  and  is  humanly  shapely.  To  demai 
of  us  truth  to  nature,  excluding  Philosophy,  is  really 
bid  a  pumpkin  caper.  As  much  as  legs  are  wanted  for  t' 
dance,  Philosophy  is  required  to  make  our  human  natu 
credible  and  acceptable.  Fiction  implores  you  to  heave 
bigger  breast  and  take  her  in  with  this  heavenly  preserv 
tive  helpmate,  her  inspiration  and  her  essence.  You  ha 
to  teach  your  imagination  of  the  feminine  image  you  ha 
set  up  to  bend  your  civilized  knees  to,  that  it  must  temp 
its  fastidiousness,  shun  the  grossness  of  the  overdaint 
Or,  to  speak  in  the  philosophic  tongue,  you  must  turn  < 
yourself,  resolutely  track  and  seize  that  burrower,  ai 
scrub  and  cleanse  him;  by  which  process,  during  t] 
course  of  it,  you  will  arrive  at  the  conception  of  the  rig' 
heroical  woman  for  you  to  worship :  and  if  you  prove  to  1 
of  some  spiritual  stature,  you  may  reach  to  an  ideal  of  t] 
heroical  feminine  type  for  the  worship  of  mankind,  i 
image  as  yet  in  poetic  outline  only,  on  our  upper  skies. 

"So  well  do  we  know  ourselves,  that  we  one  and  a 
determine  to  know   a  purer,"   says  the  heroine  of   n 


AN  IRISH  BALL  17 

columns.  Philosophy  in  fiction  tells,  among  various  other 
matters,  of  the  perils  of  this  intimate  acquaintance  with  a 
flattering  familiar  in  the  "  purer  "  —  a  person  who  more 
than  ceases  to  be  of  use  to  us  after  his  ideal  shall  have  led 
up  men  from  their  flint  and  arrowhead  caverns  to  inter- 
communicative  daylight.  For  when  the  fictitious  creature 
has  performed  that  service  of  helping  to  civilize  the  world, 
it  becomes  the  most  dangerous  of  delusions,  causing  first 
the  individual  to  despise  the  mass,  and  then  to  join  the 
mass  in  crushing  the  individual.  Wherewith  let  us  to  our 
story,  the  froth  being  out  of  the  bottle. 


CHAPTEK  II 

AN    IRISH    BALL 


In  the  Assembly  Rooms  of  the  capital  city  of  the  Sister 
Island  there  was  a  public  Ball,  to  celebrate  the  return  to 
Erin  of  a  British  hero  of  Irish  blood,  after  his  victorious 
Indian  campaign;  a  mighty  struggle  splendidly  ended;  and 
truly  could  it  be  said  that  all  Erin  danced  to  meet  him ; 
but  this  was  the  pick  of  the  dancing,  past  dispute  the  pick 
of  the  supping.  Outside  those  halls  the  supping  was  done 
in  Lazarus  fashion,  mainly  through  an  excessive  straining 
of  the  organs  of  hearing  and  vision,  which  imparted  the 
readiness  for  more,  declared  by  physicians  to  be  the  state 
inducing  to  sound  digestion.  Some  one  spied  the  figure  of 
the  hero  at  a  window  and  was  fed;  some  only  to  hear  the 
tale  chewed  the  cud  of  it;  some  told  of  having  seen  him 
mount  the  steps;  and  sure  it  was  that  at  an  hour  of  the 
night,  no  matter  when,  and  never  mind  a  drop  or  two 
of  cloud,  he  would  come  down  them  again,  and  have  an 
Irish  cheer  to  freshen  his  pillow.  For  H  is  Ireland  gives 
England  her  soldiers,  her  generals  too.  Farther  away, 
over  field  and  bogland,  the  whiskies  did  their  excellent  an- 
cient service  of  watering  the  dry  and  drying  the  damp,  to 
the  toast  of  "Lord  Larrian,  God  bless  him !  he  's  an  honour 

2 


18  DIANA  OF   THE   CROSS  WAYS 

to  the  old  country! "  and  a  bit  of  a  sigh  to  follow,  hints  of 
a  story,  and  loud  laughter,  a  drink,  a  deeper  sigh,  settling 
into  conversation  upon  the  brave  Lord  Larrian's  deeds, 
and  an  Irish  regiment  he  favoured  —  had  no  taste  for  the 
enemy  without  the  backing  of  his  "boys."  Not  he.  Why, 
he 'd  never  march  to  battle  and  they  not  handy;  because 
when  he  struck  he  struck  hard,  he  said.  And  he  has  a 
wound  on  the  right  hip  and  two  fingers  off  his  left  hand; 
has  bled  for  England,  to  show  her  what  Irishmen  are  when 
they  're  well  treated. 

The  fine  old  warrior  standing  at  the  upper  end  of  the 
long  saloon,  tall,  straight,  grey-haired,  martial  in  his 
aspect  and  decorations,  was  worthy  to  be  the  flag-pole  for 
enthusiasm.  His  large  grey  eyes  lightened  from  time  to 
time  as  he  ranged  them  over  the  floating  couples,  and 
dropped  a  word  of  inquiry  to  his  aide.  Captain  Sir  Lukin 
Dunstane,  a  good  model  of  a  cavalry  officer,  though  some- 
what a  giant,  equally  happy  with  his  chief  in  passing  the 
troops  of  animated  ladies  under  review.  He  named  as 
many  as  were  known  to  him.  Eeviewing  women  exqui- 
sitely attired  for  inspection,  all  variously  and  charmingly 
smiling,  is  a  relief  after  the  monotonous  regiments  of  men. 
Ireland  had  done  her  best  to  present  the  hero  of  her  blood 
an  agreeable  change;  and  he  too  expressed  a  patriotic 
satisfaction  on  hearing  that  the  faces  most  admired  by 
him  were  of  the  native  isle.  He  looked  upon  one  that 
came  whirling  up  to  him  on  a  young  officer's  arm  and 
swept  olf  into  the  crowd  of  tops,  for  a  considerable  while 
before  he  put  his  customary  question.  She  was  returning 
on  the  spin  when  he  said,  — 

"Who  is  she?" 

Sir  Lukin  did  not  know.  "She's  a  new  bird;  she 
nodded  to  my  wife;  I'll  ask." 

He  manoeuvred  a  few  steps  cleverly  to  where  his  wife 
reposed.  Tlie  information  he  gathered  for  the  behoof  of 
his  chief  was,  that  the  handsome  creature  answered  to  the 
name  of  Miss  Merion;  Irish;  aged  somewhere  between 
eighteen  and  nineteen;  a  dear  friend  of  his  wife's,  and  he 
ought  to  have  remembered  her;  but  she  was  a  child  when 
he  saw  her  last. 

"Dan  Merion  died,  I  remember,  about  the  day  of  my 


AN  IRISH  BALL  19 

sailing  for  India/' said  the  General.     "She  may  be  his 
daughter." 

The  bright  cynosure  rounded  up  to  him  in  the  web  of  the 
waltz,  with  her  dark  eyes  for  Lady  Dunstane,  and  vanished 
again  among  the  twisting  columns. 

He  made  his  way,  handsomely  bumped  by  an  apologetic 
pair,  to  Lady  Dunstane,  beside  whom  a  seat  was  vacated  for 
him ;  and  he  trusted  she  had  not  over-fatigued  herself. 

"  Confess,"  she  replied;  "you  are  perishing  to  know  more 
than  Lukin  has  been  able  to  tell  you.  Let  me  hear  that  you 
admire  her :  it  pleases  me ;  and  you  shall  hear  what  will 
please  you  as  much,  I  promise  you,  General.'^ 

"  I  do.     Who  would  n't  ?  "  said  he  frankly. 

"  She  crossed  the  Channel  expressly  to  dance  here  to-night 
at  the  public  Ball  in  honour  of  you." 

"  Where  she  appears,  the  first  person  falls  to  second  rank, 
and  accepts  it  humbly." 

"  That  is  grandly  spoken." 

"  She  makes  everything  in  the  room  dust  round  a  blazing 
jewel." 

"  She  makes  a  poet  of  a  soldier.  Well,  that  you  may 
understand  how  pleased  I  am,  she  is  my  dearest  friend, 
though  she  is  younger  than  T,  as  may  be  seen  ;  she  is  the 
only  friend  I  have.  I  nursed  her  when  she  was  an  infant ; 
my  father  and  Mr.  Dan  Merion  were  chums.  We  were 
parted  by  my  marriage  and  the  voyage  to  India.  We  have 
not  yet  exchanged  a  syllable :  she  was  snapped  up,  of  course, 
the  moment  she  entered  the  room.  I  knew  she  would  be  a 
taking  girl :  how  lovely,  I  did  not  guess.  You  are  right, 
she  extinguishes  the  others.  She  used  to  be  the  sprightliest 
of  living  creatures,  and  to  judge  by  her  letters,  that  has  not 
faded.     She  's  in  the  market,  General." 

Lord  Larrian  nodded  to  everything  he  heard,  concluding 
with  a  mock  doleful  shake  of  the  head.  ^^  My  poorest  sub- 
altern !  "  he  sighed,  in  the  theatrical  but  cordially  melan- 
choly style  of  green  age  viewing   Cytherea's  market. 

His  poorest  subaltern  was  richer  than  he  in  the  where- 
withal to  bid  for  such  prizes. 

"  What  is  her  name  in  addition  to  Merion  ?  " 

"  Diana  Antonia  Merion.  Tony  to  me,  Diana  to  the 
world." 


20  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  She  lives  over  there  ?  " 

"  In  England,  or  anywhere ;  wherever  she  is  taken  in. 
She  will  live,  I  hope,  chiefly  with  me.'^ 

"And  honest  Irish  ?  " 

"  Oh,  she  's  Irish." 

"  Ah  !  "  the  General  was  Irish  to  the  heels  that  night. 

Before  further  could  be  said  the  fair  object  of  the  dialogue 
came  darting  on  a  trip  of  little  runs,  both  hands  out,  all  her 
face  one  tender  sparkle  of  a  smile  ;  and  her  cry  proved  the 
quality  of  her  blood :  "  Emmy !    Emmy !    my  heart !  " 

"My  dear  Tony  !  I  should  not  have  come  but  for  the 
hope  of  seeing  you  here.'^ 

Lord  Larrian  rose  and  received  a  hurried  acknowledgment 
of  his  courtesy  from  the  usurper  of  his  place. 

"  Emmy !  we  might  kiss  and  hug  ;  we  're  in  Ireland.  I 
burn  to  !  But  you  're  not  still  ill,  dear  ?  Say  no  !  That 
Indian  fever  must  have  gone.  You  do  look  a  dash  pale,  my 
own;  you *re  tired." 

"  One  dance  has  tired  me.     Why  were  you  so  late  ?  " 

"  To  give  the  others  a  chance  ?  To  produce  a  greater 
impression  by  suspense  ?  No  and  no.  I  wrote  you  I  was 
with  the  Pettigrews.  We  caught  the  coach,  we  caught  the 
boat,  we  were  only  two  hours  late  for  the  Ball ;  so  we  did 
wonders.  And  good  Mrs.  Pettigrew  is  pining  somewhere 
to  complete  her  adornment.  I  was  in  the  crush,  spying  for 
Emmy,  when  Mr.  Mayor  informed  me  it  was  the  duty  of 
every  Irishwoman  to  dance  her  toes  off,  if  she  'd  be  known 
for  what  she  is.  And  twirl !  a  man  had  me  by  the  waist, 
and  I  dying  to  find  you." 

"  Who  was  the  man  ?  " 

"  Not  to  save  these  limbs  from  the  lighted  stake  could  I 
tell  you !  " 

"  You  are  to  perform  a  ceremonious  bow  to  Lord  Larrian." 

"  Chatter  first !    a  little  !  " 

The  plea  for  chatter  was  disregarded.  It  was  visible  that 
the  hero  of  the  night  hung  listening  and  in  expectation. 
He  and  the  Beauty  were  named  to  one  another,  and  they 
chatted  through  a  quadrille.  Sir  Lukin  introduced  a  fellow 
Harrovian  of  old  days,  Mr.  Thomas  Redworth,  to  his  wife. 

"Our  weather-prophet,  meteorologist,"  he  remarked,  to 
set  them  going;  "you  remember,  in  India,  my  pointing  to 


AN  IRISH  BALL  21 

you  his  name  in  a  newspaper-letter  on  the  subject.  He  was 
generally  safe  for  the  cricketing  days." 

Lady  Dunstane  kindly  appeared  to  call  it  to  mind,  and 
she  led  upon  the  theme  —  queried  at  times  by  an  abrupt 
"  Eh  ?  "  and  "  I  beg  pardon,"  for  manifestly  his  gaze  and 
one  of  his  ears,  if  not  the  pair,  were  given  to  the  young  lady 
discoursing  with  Lord  Larrian.  Beauty  is  rare  ;  luckily  is 
it  rare,  or,  judging  from  its  effect  on  men,  and  the  very 
stoutest  of  them,  our  world  would  be  internally  a  more  dis- 
tracted planet  than  we  see,  to  the  perversion  of  business, 
courtesy,  rights  of  property,  and  the  rest.  She  perceived 
an  incipient  victim,  of  the  hundreds  she  anticipated,  and 
she  very  tolerantly  talked  on :  "  The  weather  and  women 
have  some  resemblance  they  say.  Is  it  true  that  he  who 
reads  the  one  can  read  the  other  ?  '* 

Lord  Larrian  here  burst  into  a  brave  old  laugh,  exclaim- 
ing, "  Oh  !  good  !  " 

Mr.  Kedworth  knitted  his  thick  brows.  "  I  beg  pardon  ? 
Ah !  women  !  Weather  and  women  ?  No  ;  the  one  point 
more  variable  in  women  makes  all  the  difference." 

"  Can  you  tell  me  what  the  General  laughed  at  ?  " 

The  honest  Englishman  entered  the  trap  with  prompti- 
tude.    "  She  said  :  —  who  is  she,  may  I  ask  you  ?  " 

Lady  Dunstane  mentioned  her  name. 

Daughter  of  the  famous  Dan  Merion  ?  The  young  lady 
merited  examination  for  her  father's  sake.  But  when  re- 
minded of  her  laughter-moving  speech,  Mr.  Eedworth 
bungled  it ;  he  owned  he  spoilt  it,  and  candidly  stated  his 
inability  to  see  the  fun.  "  She  said,  St.  George's  Channel 
in  a  gale  ought  to  be  called  St.  Patrick's  —  something  —  I 
missed  some  point.  That  quadrille-tune,  the  Pastourelle,  or 
something  .  .  ." 

^'  She  had  experience  of  the  Channel  last  night,"  Lady 
Dunstane  pursued,  and  they  both,  while  in  seeming  con- 
verse, caught  snatches  from  their  neighbours,  during  a  pause 
of  the  dance. 

The  sparkling  Diana  said  to  Lord  Larrian,  "  You 
really  decline  to  make  any  of  us  proud  women  by  dancing 
to-night  ?  " 

The  General  answered :  "  I  might  do  it  on  two  stilts ;  I 
can't  on  one."     He  touched  his  veteran  leg. 


22  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

*^But  surely,"  said  she,  "there's  always  an  inspiration 
coming  to  it  from  its  partner  in  motion,  if  one  of  them 
takes  the  step." 

He  signified  a  woeful  negative.  ^'  My  dear  young  lady, 
you  say  dark  things  to  grey  hairs  !  " 

She  rejoined  :  "  If  we  were  over  in  England,  and  you 
fixed  on  me  the  stigma  of  saying  dark  things,  I  should 
never  speak  without  being  thought  obscure." 

"  It 's  because  you  flash  too  brightly  for  them." 

"  I  think  it  is  rather  the  reminiscence  of  the  tooth  that 
once  received  a  stone  when  it  expected  candy." 

Again  the  General  laughed ;  he  looked  pleased  and 
warmed.  "  Yes,  that 's  their  wa.j,  that 's  their  way  !  "  and 
he  repeated  her  words  to  himself,  diminishing  their  im- 
portance as  he  stamped  them  on  his  memory,  but  so 
heartily  admiring  the  lovely  speaker,  that  he  considered 
her  wit  an  honour  to  the  old  country,  and  told  her  so. 
Irish  prevailed  up  to  boiling-point. 

Lady  Dunstane,  not  less  gratified,  glanced  up  at  Mr. 
Kedworth,  whose  brows  bore  the  knot  of  perplexity  over 
a  strong  stare.  He,  too,  stamped  the  words  on  his  memory, 
to  see  subsequently  whether  they  had  a  vestige  of  meaning. 
Terrifically  precocious,  he  thought  her.  Lady  Dunstane,  in 
her  quick  sympathy  with  her  friend,  read  the  adverse  mind 
in  his  face.  And  her  reading  of  the  mind  was  right,  wrong 
altogether  her  deduction  of  the  corresponding  sentiment. 

Music  was  resumed  to  confuse  the  hearing  of  the  eaves- 
droppers. 

They  beheld  a  quaint  spectacle :  a  gentleman,  obviously 
an  Englishman,  approached,  with  the  evident  intention  of 
reminding  the  Beauty  of  the  night  of  her  engagement  to 
him,  and  claiming  her,  as  it  were,  in  the  lion's  jaws.  He 
advanced  a  foot,  withdrew  it,  advanced,  withdrew;  eager 
for  his  prize,  not  over  enterprising ;  in  awe  of  the  illus- 
trious General  she  entertained  —  presumeably  quite  un- 
aware of  the  pretender's  presence  ;  whereupon  a  voice  was 
heard :  "  Oh  !  if  it  was  minuetting  you  meant  before  the 
lady,  I'd  never  have  disputed  your  right  to  perform,  sir." 
For  it  seemed  that  there  were  two  claimants  in  the  field, 
an  Irishman  and  an  Englishman  ;  and  the  former,  having 
a  livelier  sense  of  the  situation,  hung  aloof  in  waiting  for 


AN  IRISH  BALL  23 

her  eye ;  the  latter  directed  himself  to  strike  bluntly  at 
his  prey ;  and  he  continued  minuetting,  now  rapidly  blink- 
ing, flushed,  angry,  conscious  of  awkwardness  and  a  tangle 
incapable  of  extrication.  He  began  to  blink  horribly  under 
the  raillery  of  his  rival.  The  General  observed  him,  but 
as  an  object  remote  and  minute,  a  fly  or  gnat.  The  face 
of  the  brilliant  Diana  was  entirely  devoted  to  him  she 
amused. 

Lady  Dunstane  had  the  faint  lines  of  a  decorous  laugh 
on  her  lips,  as  she  said  :  "  How  odd  it  is  that  our  men 
show  to  such  disadvantage  in  a  Ball-room.  I  have  seen 
them  in  danger,  and  there  they  shine  first  of  any,  and  one 
is  proud  of  them.  They  should  always  be  facing  the  ele- 
ments or  in  action."  She  glanced  at  the  minuet,  which 
had  become  a  petrified  figure,  still  palpitating,  bent  for- 
ward, an  interrogative  reminder. 

Mr.  Eedworth  reserved  his  assent  to  the  proclamation  of 
any  English  disadvantage.  A  whiff  of  Celtic  hostility  in 
the  atmosphere  put  him  on  his  mettle.  '*  Wherever  the 
man  is  tried,"  he  said. 

"My  lady!"  the  Irish  gentleman  bowed  to  Lady  Dun- 
stane. "  I  had  the  honour  .  .  .  Sullivan  Smith  ...  at  the 
castle  .  .  ." 

She  responded  to  the  salute,  and  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith 
proceeded  to  tell  her,  half  in  speech,  half  in  dots  most 
luminous,  of  a  civil  contention  between  the  English  gentle- 
man and  himself,  as  to  the  possession  of  the  loveliest  of 
partners  for  this  particular  ensuing  dance,  and  that  they 
had  simultaneously  made  a  rush  from  the  Lower  Courts, 
namely,  their  cards,  to  the  Upper,  being  the  lady  ;  and 
Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  partly  founded  his  preferable  claim  on 
her  Irish  descent,  and  on  his  acquaintance  with  her  eminent 
defunct  father  —  one  of  the  ever-radiating  stars  of  his 
quenchless  country. 

Lady  Dunstane  sympathized  with  him  for  his  not  intrud- 
ing his  claim  when  the  young  lady  stood  pre-engaged,  as 
well  as  in  humorous  appreciation  of  his  imaginative  logic. 

"There  will  be  dancing  enough  after  supper,"  she  said. 

"  If  I  could  score  one  dance  with  her,  I  'd  go  home 
supperless  and  feasted,"  said  he.  "And  that*s  not  saying 
much  among  the  hordes  of  hungry  troopers  tip-toe  for  the 


24  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

signal  to  the  buffet.  See,  my  lady,  the  gentleman,  as  we 
call  him  ;  there  he  is  working  his  gamut  perpetually  up  to  da 
capo.  Oh !  but  it 's  a  sheep  trying  to  be  wolf;  he  's  sheep- 
eyed  and  he  's  wolf-fanged,  pathetic  and  larcenous !  Oh, 
now!  who'd  believe  it! — the  man  has  dared  .  .  .  I'd  as 
soon  think  of  committing  sacrilege  in  a  cathedral !  " 

The  man  was  actually,  to  quote  his  indignant  rival, 
"  breaching  the  fortress,"  and  pointing  out  to  Diana  Merion 
"  her  name  on  his  dirty  scrap  of  paper  "  :  a  shocking  sight 
when  the  lady's  recollection  was  the  sole  point  to  be  aimed 
at,  and  the  only  umpire.  "  As  if  all  of  us  could  n't  have 
written  that,  and  had  n't  done  it ! "  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith 
groaned  disgusted.  He  hated  bad  manners,  particularly  in 
cases  involving  ladies ;  and  the  bad  manners  of  a  Saxon 
fired  his  antagonism  to  the  race ;  individual  members  of 
which  he  boasted  of  forgiving  and  embracing,  honouring. 
So  the  man  blackened  the  race  for  him,  and  the  race  was 
excused  in  the  man.  But  his  hatred  of  bad  manners  was 
vehement,  and  would  have  extended  to  a  fellow-country- 
man. His  own  were  of  the  antecedent  century,  therefore 
venerable. 

Diana  turned  from  her  pursuer  with  a  comic  woeful  lift- 
ing of  the  brows  at  her  friend.  Lady  Dunstane  motioned 
her  fan,  and  Diana  came,  bending  head. 

"  Are  you  bound  in  honour  ?  '* 

"  I  don't  think  I  am.  And  I  do  want  to  go  on  talking 
with  the  General.  He  is  so  delightful  and  modest  —  my 
dream  of  a  true  soldier  I  — telling  me  of  his  last  big  battle, 
bit  by  bit,  to  my  fishing." 

"Put  off  this  person  for  a  square  dance  down  the  list, 
and  take  out  Mr.  Redworth  —  Miss  Diana  Merion,  Mr. 
Bedworth :  he  will  bring  you  back  to  the  General,  who 
must  not  totally  absorb  you,  or  he  will  forfeit  his 
popularity." 

Diana  instantly  struck  a  treaty  with  the  pertinacious 
advocate  of  his  claims,  to  whom,  on  his  relinquishing  her, 
Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  remarked  :  "  Oh !  sir,  the  law  of  it, 
where  a  lady 's  concerned !  You  're  one  for  evictions,  I 
should  guess,  and  the  anti-human  process.  It 's  that  letter 
of  the  law  that  stands  between  you  and  me  and  mine  and 
yours.  But  you've  got  your  congee,  and  my  blessing 
on  ye!" 


AN  IRISH  BALL  25 

**  It  was  a  positive  engagement,"  said  the  enemy. 

Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  derided  him.  "  And  a  pretty  partner 
youVe  pickled  for  yourself  when  she  keeps  her  positive 
engagement ! " 

He  besought  Lady  Dunstane  to  console  him  with  a  turn. 
She  pleaded  weariness.  He  proposed  to  sit  beside  her  and 
divert  her.  She  smiled,  but  warned  him  that  she  was  Eng- 
lish in  every  vein.  He  interjected  :  "  Irish  men  and  Eng- 
lish women  !  though  it 's  putting  the  cart  before  the  horse 
—  the  copper  pennies  where  the  gold  guineas  should  be. 
So  here's  the  gentleman  who  takes  the  oyster,  like  the 
lawyer  of  the  fable.  English  is  he  ?  But  we  read,  the 
last  shall  be  first.  And  English  women  and  Irish  men 
make  the  finest  coupling  in  the  universe." 

"  Well,  you  must  submit  to  see  an  Irish  woman  led  out 
by  an  English  man,"  said  Lady  Dunstane,  at  the  same  time 
informing  the  obedient  Diana,  then  bestowing  her  hand 
on  Mr.  Redworth  to  please  her  friend,  that  he  was  a 
schoolfellow  of  her  husband^s. 

"  Favour  can't  help  coming  by  rotation,  except  in  very 
extraordinary  circumstances,  and  he  was  ahead  of  me  with 
you,  and  takes  my  due,  and  't  would  be  hard  on  me  if  I 
were  n't  thoroughly  indemnified."  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith 
bowed.  "  You  gave  them  just  the  start  over  the  frozen 
minute  for  conversation ;  they  were  total  strangers,  and  he 
does  n't  appear  a  bad  sort  of  fellow  for  a  temporary  mate, 
though  he  's  not  perfectly  sure  of  his  legs.  And  that  we  '11 
excuse  to  any  man  leading  out  such  a  fresh  young  beauty  of 
a  Bright  Eyes  —  like  the  stars  of  a  winter's  night  in  the 
frosty  season  over  Columkill,  or  where  you  will,  so  that 's 
in  Ireland,  to  be  sure  of  the  likeness  to  her." 

"  Her  mother  was  half  English." 

"  Of  course  she  was.  And  what  was  my  observation 
about  the  coupling  ?  Dan  Merion  would  make  her  Irish  all 
over.  And  she  has  a  vein  of  Spanish  blood  in  her  ;  for  he 
had ;  and  she  's  got  the  colour.  —  But  you  spoke  of  their 
coupling  —  or  I  did.  Oh,  a  man  can  hold  his  own  with  an 
English  roly-poly  mate  :  he  's  not  stifled.  But  a  woman 
has  n't  his  power  of  resistance  to  dead  weight.  She  *s 
volatile,  she  's  frivolous,  a  rattler  and  gabbler  —  have  n't  I 
heard  what  they  say  of  Irish  girls  over  there  ?    She  marries. 


26  DIANA  OP  THE  CROSSWAYS 

and  it 's  the  end  of  her  sparkling.  She  must  choose  at 
home  for  a  perfect  harmonious  partner." 

Lady  Dunstane  expressed  her  opinion  that  her  couple 
danced  excellently  together. 

"  It  'd  be  a  bitter  thing  to  see,  if  the  fellow  could  n't  dance, 
after  leading  her  out !  "  sighed  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith.  "•  I 
heard  of  her  over  there.  They  call  her  the  Black  Pearl, 
and  the  Irish  Lily  —  because  she  's  dark.  They  rack  their 
poor  brains  to  get  the  laugh  of  us." 

"And  I  listen  to  you,"  said  Lady  Dunstane. 

"  Ah !  if  all  England,  half,  a  quarter,  the  smallest  piece 
of  the  land  were  like  you,  my  lady,  I  'd  be  loyal  to  the 
finger-nails.  Now,  is  she  engaged  ?  —  when  I  get  a  word 
with  her  ?  " 

"  She  is  nineteen,  or  nearly,  and  she  ought  to  have  five 
good  years  of  freedom,  I  think." 

"  And  five  good  years  of  serfdom  I  'd  serve  to  win  her !  " 

A  look  at  him  under  the  eyelids  assured  Lady  Dunstane 
that  there  would  be  small  chance  for  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith, 
after  a  life  of  bondage,  if  she  knew  her  Diana,  in  spite  of 
his  tongue,  his  tact,  his  lively  features  and  breadth  of 
shoulders. 

Up  he  sprang.  Diana  was  on  Mr.  Eedworth's  arm. 
"No  refreshments,"  she  said;  and  "this  is  my  refresh- 
ment," taking  the  seat  of  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith,  who 
ejaculated,  — 

"I  must  go  and  have  that  gentleman's  name."  He 
wanted  a  foe. 

"  You  know  you  are  ready  to  coquette  with  the  General 
at  any  moment,  Tony,"  said  her  friend. 

"Yes,  with  the  General!  " 

"He  is  a  noble  old  man." 

"  Superb.  And  don't  say '  old  man. '  With  his  uniform 
and  his  height  and  his  grey  head,  he  is  like  a  glorious 
October  day  just  before  the  brown  leaves  fall." 

Diana  hummed  a  little  of  the  air  of  Planxty  Kelly,  the 
favourite  of  her  childhood,  as  Lady  Dunstane  well  remem- 
bered, and  they  smiled  together  at  the  scenes  and  times  it 
recalled. 

"Do  you  still  write  verses,  Tony?  " 

"  I  could  about  him.     At  one  part  of  the  fight  he  thought 


AN  IRISH  BALL  27 

he  would  be  beaten.  He  was  overmatched  in  artillery, 
and  it  was  a  cavalry  charge  he  thundered  on  them,  riding 
across  the  field  to  give  the  word  of  command  to  the  couple 
of  regiments,  riddled  to  threads,  that  gained  the  day. 
That  is  life  —  when  we  dare  death  to  live!  I  wonder  at 
men,  who  are  me/i,  being  anything  but  soldiers!  I  told 
you,  madre,  my  own  Emmy,  I  forgave  you  for  marrying, 
because  it  was  a  soldier." 

"Perhaps  a  soldier  is  to  be  the  happy  man.  But  you 
have  not  told  me  a  word  of  yourself.  What  has  been  done 
with  the  old  Crossways?" 

"The  house,  you  know,  is  mine.  And  it 's  all  I  have: 
ten  acres  and  the  house,  furnished,  and  let  for  less  than 
two  hundred  a  year.  Oh!  how  I  long  to  evict  the  tenants! 
They  can't  have  my  feeling  for  the  place  where  I  was 
born.  They  're  people  of  tolerably  good  connections, 
middling  wealthy,  I  suppose,  of  the  name  of  Warwick, 
and,  as  far  as  I  can  understand,  they  stick  there  to  be 
near  the  Sussex  Downs,  for  a  nephew,  who  likes  to  ride 
on  them.  I  We  a  half  engagement,  barely  legible,  to  visit 
them  on  an  indefinite  day,  and  can't  bear  the  idea  of 
strangers  masters  in  the  old  house.  I  must  be  driven 
there  for  shelter,  for  a  roof,  some  month.  And  I  could 
make  a  pilgrimage  in  rain  or  snow  just  to  doat  on  the 
outside  of  it.     That 's  your  Tony." 

"She  's  my  darling." 

"I  hear  myself  speak!  But  your  voice  or  mine,  madre, 
it 's  one  soul.  Be  sure  I  am  giving  up  the  ghost  when  I 
cease  to  be  one  soul  with  you,  dear  and  dearest!  No 
secrets,  never  a  shadow  of  a  deception,  or  else  I  shall  feel 
I  am  not  fit  to  live.  Was  I  a  bad  correspondent  when  you 
were  in  India?  " 

"  Pretty  well.     Copious  letters  when  you  did  write." 

"  I  was  shy.  I  knew  I  should  be  writing  to  Emmy  and 
another,  and  only  when  I  came  to  the  flow  could  I  forget 
him.  He  is  very  finely  built;  and  I  dare  say  he  has  a 
head.  I  read  of  his  deeds  in  India  and  quivered.  But  he 
was  just  a  bit  in  the  way.  Men  are  the  barriers  to  perfect 
naturalness,  at  least,  with  girls,  I  think.  You  wrote  to 
me  in  the  same  tone  as  ever,  and  at  first  I  had  a  struggle 
to  reply.  And  I^  who  have  such  pride  in  being  always 
myself! " 


28  DIANA  OP  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

Two  staring  semi-circles  had  formed,  one  to  front  the 
Hero,  the  other  the  Beauty.  These  half  moons  impercepti- 
bly dissolved  to  replenish,  and  became  a  fixed  obstruction. 

"Yes,  they  look,"  Diana  made  answer  to  Lady  Dunstane's 
comment  on  the  curious  impertinence.  She  was  getting 
used  to  it,  and  her  friend  had  a  gratification  in  seeing  how 
little  this  affected  her  perfect  naturalness. 

"You  are  often  in  the  world  —  dinners,  dances?"  she 
said. 

"People  are  kind." 

"Any  proposals?" 

"Nibbles." 

"Quite  heart-free?" 

"Absolutely." 

Diana's  unshadowed  bright  face  defied  all  menace  of  an 
eclipse. 

The  block  of  sturdy  gazers  began  to  melt.  The  General 
had  dispersed  his  group  of  satellites  by  a  movement  with 
the  Mayoress  on  his  arm,  construed  as  the  signal  for  pro- 
cession to  the  supper-table. 


CHAPTEE  III 


THE  INTERIOR  OF  MR.  REDWORTH  AND  THE  EXTERIOR 
OF  MR.  SULLIVAN  SMITH 

"It  may  be  as  well  to  take  Mr.  Eedworth's  arm ;  you  will 
escape  the  crush  for  you,"  said  Lady  Dunstane  to  Diana. 
"I  don't  sup.  Yes!  go!  You  must  eat,  and  he  is  handi- 
est to  conduct  you." 

Diana  thought  of  her  chaperon  and  the  lateness  of  the 
hour.  She  murmured,  to  soften  her  conscience,  "Poor 
Mrs.  Pettigrew!" 

And  once  more  Mr.  Kedworth,  outwardly  imperturbable, 
was  in  the  maelstrom  of  a  happiness  resembling  tempest. 
He  talked,  and  knew  not  what  he  uttered.  To  give  this 
matchless  girl  the  best  to  eat  and  drink  was  his  business, 
and  he  performed  it.     Oddly,  for  a  man  who  had  no  loaded 


MR.   RED  WORTH  AND  MR.    SULLIVAN   SMITH        29 

design,  marshalling  the  troops  in  his  active  and  capacious 
cranium,  he  fell  upon  calculations  of  his  income,  present 
and  prospective,  while  she  sat  at  the  table  and  he  stood 
behind  her.  Others  were  wrangling  for  places,  chairs, 
plates,  glasses,  game-pie,  champagne:  she  had  them;  the 
lady  under  his  charge  to  a  certainty  would  have  them;  so 
far  good;  and  he  had  seven  hundred  pounds  per  annum 
—  seven  hundred  and  fifty,  in  a  favourable  aspect,  at  a 
stretch.   .   .   . 

"  Yes,  the  pleasantest  thing  to  me  after  working  all  day 
is  an  opera  of  Carini's,"  he  said,  in  full  accord  with  her 
taste,  "and  Tellio  for  tenor,  certainly." 

—  A  fair  enough  sum  for  a  bachelor :  four  hundred  per- 
sonal income,  and  a  prospect  of  higher  dividends  to 
increase  it;  three  hundred  odd  from  his  office,  and  no 
immediate  prospects  of  an  increase  there;  no  one  died 
there,  no  elderly  martyr  for  the  advancement  of  his  juniors 
could  be  persuaded  to  die ;  they  were  too  tough  to  think  of 
retiring.  Say,  seven  hundred  and  fifty.  .  .  .  eight  hun- 
dred, if  the  commerce  of  the  country  fortified  the  Bank 
his  property  was  embarked  in;  or  eight-fifty:  or  nine, 
ten.  .  .  . 

"I  could  call  him  my  poet  also,"  Mr.  Redworth  agreed 
with  her  taste  in  poets.  "  His  letters  are  among  the  best 
ever  written  —  or  ever  published :  the  raciest  English  I 
know.  Frank,  straight  out:  capital  descriptions.  The 
best  English  letter-writers  are  as  good  as  the  French  — 
You  don't  think  so?  —  in  their  way,  of  course.  I  dare  say 
we  don't  sufficiently  cultivate  the  art.  We  require  the 
supple  tongue  a  closer  intercourse  of  society  gives." 

—  Eight  or  ten  hundred.  Comfortable  enough  for  a  man 
in  chambers.  To  dream  of  entering  as  a  householder  on 
that  sum,  in  these  days,  would  be  stark  nonsense :  and  a 
man  two  removes  from  a  baronetcy  has  no  right  to  set  his 
reckoning  on  deaths :  —  if  he  does,  he  becomes  a  sort  of 
meditative  assassin.  But  what  were  the  Fates  about  when 
they  planted  a  man  of  the  ability  of  Tom  Kedworth  in  a 
Government  office !  Clearly  they  intended  him  to  remain 
a  bachelor  for  life.  And  they  sent  him  over  to  Ireland 
on  inspection  duty  for  a  month  to  have  sight  of  an  Irish 
Beauty.  .  .  . 


30  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"Think  war  the  finest  subject  for  poets?"  he  exclaimed. 
"Flatly  no:  I  don't  think  it.  I  think  exactly  the  reverse. 
It  brings  out  the  noblest  traits  in  human  character?  I 
won't  own  that  even.  It  brings  out  some:  but  under 
excitement,  when  you  have  not  always  the  real  man.  — 
Pray  don't  sneer  at  domestic  life.  Well,  there  was  a  sus- 
picion of  disdain.  —  Yes,  I  can  respect  the  hero,  military 
or  civil;  with  this  distinction,  that  the  military  hero  aims 
at  personal  reward  —  " 

"He  braves  wounds  and  death,"  interposed  Diana. 

"  Whereas  the  civilian  hero  —  " 

"Pardon  me,  let  me  deny  that  the  soldier-hero  aims  at  a 
personal  reward,"  she  again  interposed. 

"He  gets  it." 

"If  he  is  not  beaten." 

"And  then  he  is  no  longer  a  hero." 

"He  is  to  me." 

She  had  a  woman's  inveterate  admiration  of  the  profes- 
sion of  arms.  Mr.  Redworth  endeavoured  to  render  prac- 
ticable an  opening  in  her  mind  to  reason.  He  admitted 
the  grandeur  of  the  poetry  of  Homer.  We  are  a  few  cen- 
turies in  advance  of  Homer.  We  do  not  slay  damsels  for 
a  sacrifice  to  propitiate  celestial  wrath;  nor  do  we  revel  in 
details  of  slaughter.  He  reasoned  with  her;  he  repeated 
stories  known  to  him  of  civilian  heroes,  and  won  her  assent 
to  the  heroical  title  for  their  deeds,  but  it  was  languid,  or 
not  so  bright  as  the  deeds  deserved  —  or  as  the  young  lady 
could  look;  and  he  insisted  on  the  civilian  hero,  impelled 
by  some  unconscious  motive  to  make  her  see  the  thing  he 
thought,  also  the  thing  he  was  —  his  plain  mind  and  matter- 
of-fact  nature.  Possibly  she  caught  a  glimpse  of  that. 
After  a  turn  of  fencing,  in  which  he  was  impressed  by 
the  vibration  of  her  tones  when  speaking  of  military 
heroes,  she  quitted  the  table,  saying:  "An  argument  be- 
tween one  at  supper  and  another  handing  plates,  is  rather 
unequal  if  eloquence  is  needed.  As  Pat  said  to  the  con- 
stable when  his  hands  were  tied,  you  beat  me  with  the 
fists,  but  my  spirit  is  towering  and  kicks  freely." 

—  Eight  hundred?  a  thousand  a  year,  two  thousand,  are 
as  nothing  in  the  calculation  of  a  householder  who  means 
that  the  mistress  of  the  house  shall  have  the  choicest  of 


MR.   REDWORTH  AND  MR.    SULLIVAN   SMITH        31 

khe  fruits  and  flowers  of  the  Four  Quarters ;  and  Thomas 
Redworth  had  vowed  at  his  first  outlook  on  the  world  of 
women,  that  never  should  one  of  the  sisterhood  coming 
under  his  charge  complain  of  not  having  them  in  profu- 
sion. Consequently  he  was  a  settled  bachelor.  In  the 
character  of  disengaged  and  unaspiring  philosophical  bach- 
elor, he  reviewed  the  revelations  of  her  character  betrayed 
by  the  beautiful  virgin  devoted  to  the  sanguine  coat.  The 
thrill  of  her  voice  in  speaking  of  soldier-heroes  shot  him 
to  the  yonder  side  of  a  gulf.  Not  knowing  why,  for  he 
had  no  scheme,  desperate  or  other,  in  his  head,  the  least 
affrighted  of  men  was  frightened  by  her  tastes,  and  by  her 
aplomb,  her  inoffensiveness  in  freedom  of  manner  and  self- 
sufficiency —  sign  of  purest  breeding:  and  by  her  easy, 
peerless  vivacity,  her  proofs  of  descent  from  the  blood  of 
Dan  Merion  —  a  wildish  blood.  The  candour  of  the  look 
of  her  eyes  in  speaking,  her  power  of  looking  forthright  at 
men,  and  looking  the  thing  she  spoke,  and  the  play  of  her 
voluble  lips,  the  significant  repose  of  her  lips  in  silence, 
her  weighing  of  the  words  he  uttered,  for  a  moment  before 
the  prompt  apposite  reply,  down  to  her  simple  quotation 
of  Pat,  alarmed  him;  he  did  not  ask  himself  why.  His 
manly  self  was  not  intruded  on  his  cogitations.  A  mere 
eight  hundred  or  thousand  per  annum  had  no  place  in  that 
midst.  He  beheld  her  quietly  selecting  the  position  of 
dignity  to  suit  her:  an  eminent  military  man,  or  states- 
man, or  wealthy  nobleman:  she  had  but  to  choose.  A 
war  would  offer  her  the  decorated  soldier  she  wanted.  A 
war !  Such  are  women  of  this  kind !  The  thought  revolted 
him,  and  pricked  his  appetite  for  supper.  He  did  service 
by  Mrs.  Pettigrew,  to  which  lady  Miss  Merion,  as  she 
said,  promoted  him,  at  the  table,  and  then  began  to  refresh 
in  person,  standing. 

"  Malkin!  that 's  the  fellow's  name;  "  he  heard  close  at 
his  ear. 

Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  had  drained  a  champagne-glass, 
bottle  in  hand,  and  was  priming  the  successor  to  it.  He 
cocked  his  eye  at  Mr.  Redworth's  quick  stare.  "Malkin! 
And  now  we  '11  see  whether  the  interior  of  him  is  grey,  or 
black,  or  tabby,  or  tortoise-shell,  or  any  other  colour  of 
the  Malkin  breed." 


32  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

He  explained  to  Mr.  Eedworth  that  he  had  summoned 
Mr.  Malkin  to  answer  to  him  as  a  gentleman  for  calling 
Miss  Merion  a  jilt.  "The  man,  sir,  said  in  my  hearing, 
she  jilted  him,  and  that 's  to  call  the  lady  a  jilt.  There 's 
not  a  point  of  difference,  not  a  shade.  I  overheard  him. 
I  happened  by  the  blessing  of  Providence  to  be  by  when 
he  named  her  publicly  jilt.  And  it 's  enough  that  she  's  a 
lady  to  have  me  for  her  champion.  The  same  if  she  had 
been  an  Esquimaux  squaw.  I  '11  never  live  to  hear  a  lady 
insulted." 

"  You  don't  mean  to  say  you  're  the  donkey  to  provoke  a 
duel!"  Mr.  Eedworth  burst  out  gruffly,  through  turkey 
and  stuffing. 

"And  an  Irish  lady,  the  young  Beauty  of  Erin!"  Mr. 
Sullivan  Smith  was  flowing  on.  He  became  frigid,  he 
politely  bowed :  "  Two,  sir,  if  you  have  n't  the  grace  to 
withdraw  the  offensive  term  before  it  cools  and  can't  be 
obliterated." 

"  Fiddle !  and  go  to  the  deuce !  "  Mr.  Eedworth  cried. 

"Would  a  soft  slap  o'  the  cheek  persuade  you,  sir?  " 

"  Try  it  outside,  and  don't  bother  me  with  nonsense  oi 
that  sort  at  my  supper.  If  I  'm  struck,  I  strike  back.  1 
keep  my  pistols  for  bandits  and  law-breakers.  Here,"  saic 
Mr.  Eedworth,  better  inspired  as  to  the  way  of  treating  an 
ultra  of  the  isle;  "touch  glasses:  you  're  a  gentleman,  and 
won't  disturb  good  company.     By-and-by." 

The  pleasing  prospect  of  by-and-by  renewed  in  Mr 
Sullivan  Smith  his  composure.  They  touched  the  foaminp 
glasses:  upon  which,  in  a  friendly  manner,  Mr.  Sullivai 
Smith  proposed  that  they  should  go  outside  as  soon  as  Mr. 
Eedworth  had  finished  supper  —  quite  finished  supper:  foi 
the  reason  that  the  term  "  donkey  "  affixed  to  him  was  like 
a  minster  cap  of  schooldays,  ringing  bells  on  his  topknot, 
and  also  that  it  stuck  in  his  gizzard. 

Mr.  Eedworth  declared  the  term  to  be  simply  hypothet- 
ical. "  If  you  fight,  you  're  a  donkey  for  doing  it.  But 
you  won't  fight." 

"But  I  will  fight." 

"He  won't  fight." 

"  Then  for  the  honour  of  your  country  you  must.  But 
I  'd  rather  have  him  first,  for  I  have  n't  drunk  with  him, 


MR.   REDWORTH  AND  MR.   SULLIVAN   SMITH         33 

and  it  should  be  a  case  of  necessity  to  put  a  bullet  or  a 
couple  of  inches  of  steel  through  the  man  you  've  drunk 
with.  And  what 's  in  your  favour,  she  danced  with  ye. 
She  seemed  to  take  to  ye,  and  the  man  she  has  the  smallest 
sugar-melting  for  is  sacred  if  he 's  not  sweet  to  me.  If  he 
retracts !  " 

'' Hypothetically,  No." 

"But  supposititiously?  " 

"Certainly." 

"Then  we  grasp  hands  on  it.  It 's  Malkin  or  nothing! " 
said  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith,  swinging  his  heel  moodily  to 
wander  in  search  of  the  foe.  How  one  sane  man  could 
name  another  a  donkey  for  lighting  to  clear  an  innocent 
young  lady's  reputation,  passed  his  rational  conception. 

Sir  Lukin  hastened  to  Mr.  Redworth  to  have  a  talk  over 
old  schooldays  and  fellows. 

"I'll  tell  you  what,"  said  the  civilian,  "there  are  Irish- 
men and  Irishmen.  I  've  met  cool  heads  and  long  heads 
among  them,  and  you  and  I  knew  Jack  Derry,  who  was 
good  at  most  things.  But  the  burlesque  Irishman  can't  be 
caricatured.  Nature  strained  herself  in  a  fit  of  absurdity 
to  produce  him,  and  all  that  Art  can  do  is  to  copy." 

This  was  his  prelude  to  an  account  of  Mr.  Sullivan 
Smith,  whom,  as  a  specimen,  he  rejoiced  to  have  met. 

"There's  a  chance  of  mischief,"  said  Sir  Lukin.  "I 
know  nothing  of  the  man  he  calls  Malkin.  I  '11  inquire 
presently." 

He  talked  of  his  prospects,  and  of  the  women.  Fair 
ones,  in  his  opinion,  besides  Miss  Merion  were  parading; 
he  sketched  two  or  three  of  his  partners  with  a  broad  brush 
of  epithets. 

"It  won't  do  for  Miss  Merion's  name  to  be  mixed  up  in 
a  duel,"  said  Redworth. 

"Not  if  she 's  to  make  her  fortune  in  England,"  said  Sir 
Lukin.     "It 's  probably  all  smoke." 

The  remark  had  hardly  escaped  him  when  a  wreath  of 
metaphorical  smoke,  and  fire,  and  no  mean  report,  startled 
the  company  of  supping  gentlemen.  At  the  pitch  of  his 
voice,  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  denounced  Mr.  Malkin  in  pres- 
ence for  a  cur  masquerading  as  a  cat. 

"And  that  is  not  the  scoundrel's  prime  offence.     For 

3 


o 


4  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 


what  d'  ye  think?  He  trumps  up  an  engagement  to  dance 
with  a  beautiful  lady,  and  because  she  can't  remember, 
binds  her  to  an  oath  for  a  dance  to  come,  and  then,  hold- 
ing her  prisoner  to  'm,  he  sulks,  the  dirty  dog-cat  goes 
and  sulks,  and  he  won't  dance  and  won't  do  anything  but 
screech  up  in  corners  that  he  's  jilted.  He  said  the  word. 
Dozens  of  gentlemen  heard  the  word.  And  I  demand  an 
apology  of  Misterr  Malkin  —  or  .  .  !  And  none  of  your 
guerrier  nodding  and  bravado,  Misterr  Malkin,  at  me,  if 
you  please.  The  case  is  for  settlement  between  gentle- 
men." 

The  harassed  gentleman  of  the  name  of  Malkin,  driven 
to  extremity  by  the  worrying,  stood  in  braced  preparation 
for  the  English  attitude  of  defence.  His  tormentor  drew 
closer  to  him. 

"Mind,  I  give  you  warning,  if  you  lay  a  finger  on  me 
I  '11  knock  you  down,"  said  he. 

Most  joyfully  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  uttered  a  low  melo- 
dious cry.  "For  a  specimen  of  manners,  in  an  assembly 
of  ladies  and  gentlemen  ...  I  ask  ye !  "  he  addressed  the 
ring  about  him,  to  put  his  adversary  entirely  in  the  wrong 
before  provoking  the  act  of  war.  And  then,  as  one  intend- 
ing gently  to  remonstrate,  he  was  on  the  point  of  stretch- 
ing out  his  finger  to  the  shoulder  of  Mr.  Malkin,  when 
Bedworth  seized  his  arm,  saying:  "I'm  your  man:  me 
first:  you  're  due  to  me." 

Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  beheld  the  vanishing  of  his  foe  in  a 
cloud  of  faces.  Now  was  he  wroth  on  patently  reasonable 
grounds.  He  threatened  Saxondora.  Man  up,  man  down, 
he  challenged  the  race  of  short-legged,  thickset,  wooden- 
pated  curmudgeons :  and  let  it  be  pugilism  if  their  white 
livers  shivered  at  the  notion  of  powder  and  ball.  Red- 
worth,  in  the  struggle  to  haul  him  away,  received  a  blow 
from  him.  "And  you've  got  it!  you  would  have  it!" 
roared  the  Celt. 

"Excuse  yourself  to  the  company  for  a  misdirected 
effort,"  Redworth  said;  and  he  observed  generally:  "No 
Irish  gentleman  strikes  a  blow  in  good  company." 

"  But  that 's  true  as  Writ !  And  I  offer  excuses  —  if 
you  '11  come  along  with  me  and  a  couple  of  friends.  The 
thing  has  been  done  before  by  torchlight  —  and  neatly." 


MK.   REDWORTH  AND  MR.    SULLIVAN   SlkHTH         35 

"Come  along,  and  come  alone,"  said  Kedworth. 

A  way  was  cleared  for  them.  Sir  Lukin  hurried  up  to 
Redworth,  who  had  no  doubt  of  his  ability  to  manage  Mr. 
Sullivan  Smith. 

He  managed  that  fine-hearted  but  purely  sensational 
fellow  so  well  that  Lady  Dunstane  and  Diana,  after  hear- 
ing in  some  anxiety  of  the  hubbub  below,  beheld  them 
entering  the  long  saloon  amicably,  with  the  nods  and  looks 
of  gentlemen  quietly  accordant. 

A  little  later,  Lady  Dunstane  questioned  Redworth,  and 
he  smoothed  her  apprehensions,  delivering  himself,  much 
to  her  comfort,  thus:  "In  no  case  would  any  lady's  name 
have  been  raised.  The  whole  affair  was  nonsensical. 
He's  a  capital  fellow  of  a  kind,  capable  of  behaving  like 
a  man  of  the  world  and  a  gentleman.  Only  he  has,  or 
thinks  he  has,  like  lots  of  his  countrymen,  a  raw  wound 
—  something  that  itches  to  be  grazed.  Champagne  on 
that  I  .  .  .  Irishmen,  as  far  as  I  have  seen  of  them,  are, 
like  horses,  bundles  of  nerves;  and  you  must  manage  them, 
as  you  do  with  all  nervous  creatures,  with  firmness,  but 
good  temper.  You  must  never  get  into  a  fury  of  the 
nerves  yourself  with  them.  Spur  and  whip  they  don't 
wantj  they'll  be  off  with  you  in  a  jiffy  if  you  try  it. 
They  want  the  bridle-rein.  That  seems  to  me  the  secret 
of  Irish  character.  We  English  are  not  bad  horsemen. 
It 's  a  wonder  we  blunder  so  in  our  management  of  such 
a  people." 

"  I  wish  you  were  in  a  position  to  put  your  method  to 
the  proof,"  said  she. 

He  shrugged.     "  There  's  little  chance  of  it ! " 

To  reward  him  for  his  practical  discretion,  she  contrived 
that  Diana  should  give  him  a  final  dance;  and  the  beauti- 
ful girl  smiled  quickly  responsive  to  his  appeal.  He  was, 
moreover,  sensible  in  her  look  and  speech  that  he  had 
advanced  in  her  consideration  to  be  no  longer  the  mere 
spinning  stick,  a  young  lady's  partner.  By  which  he 
humbly  understood  that  her  friend  approved  him.  A 
gentle  delirium  enfolded  his  brain.  A  householder's  life 
is  often  begun  on  eight  hundred  a  year:  on  less:  on  much 
less :  —  sometimes  on  nothing  but  resolution  to  make  a 
fitting  income,  carving  out  a  fortune.     Eight  hundred  may 


86  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

stand  as  a  superior  basis.  That  sum  is  a  distinct  point  of 
vantage.  If  it  does  not  mean  a  carriage  and  Parisian  mil- 
linery and  a  station  for  one  of  the  stars  of  society,  it  means 
at  any  rate  security ;  and  then,  the  heart  of  the  man  being 
strong  and  sound  .   .   . 

"Yes,"  he  replied  to  her,  "1  like  my  experience  of  Ire- 
land and  the  Irish;  and  better  than  I  thought  I  should. 
St.  George's  Channel  ought  to  be  crossed  oftener  by  both 
of  us." 

"I  'm  always  glad  of  the  signal,"  said  Diana. 

He  had  implied  the  people  of  the  two  islands.  He 
allowed  her  interpretation  to  remain  personal,  for  the  sake 
of  a  creeping  deliciousness  that  it  carried  through  his 
blood. 

"Shall  you  soon  be  returning  to  England?"  he  ventured 
to  ask. 

"I  am  Lady  Dunstane's  guest  for  some  months." 

"  Then  you  will.  Sir  Lukin  has  an  estate  in  Surrey. 
He  talks  of  quitting  the  Service." 

"I  can't  believe  it!" 

His  thrilled  blood  was  chilled.  She  entertained  a  sen- 
timent amounting  to  adoration  for  the  profession  of  arms ! 

Gallantly  had  the  veteran  General  and  Hero  held  on  into 
the  night,  that  the  festivity  might  not  be  dashed  by  his 
departure;  perhaps,  to  a  certain  degree,  to  prolong  his 
enjoyment  of  a  flattering  scene.  At  last  Sir  Lukin  had 
the  word  from  him,  and  came  to  his  wife.  Diana  slipped 
across  the  floor  to  her  accommodating  chaperon,  whom,  for 
the  sake  of  another  five  minutes  with  her  beloved  Emma, 
she  very  agreeably  persuaded  to  walk  in  the  train  of  Lord 
Larrian,  and  forth  they  trooped  down  a  pathway  of  nod- 
ding heads  and  curtsies,  resembling  oak  and  birch-trees 
under  a  tempered  gale,  even  to  the  shedding  of  leaves,  for 
here  a  turban  was  picked  up  by  Sir  Lukin,  there  a  jewelled 
ear-ring  by  the  self -constituted  attendant,  Mr.  Thomas 
Kedworth.  At  the  portico  rang  a  wakening  cheer,  really 
worth  hearing.  The  rain  it  rained,  and  hats  were  form- 
less, as  in  the  first  conception  of  the  edifice,  backs  were 
damp,  boots  liquidly  musical,  the  pipe  of  consolation 
smoked  with  difficulty,  with  much  pulling  at  the  stem, 
but  the  cheer  arose  magnificently,  and  multiplied  itself, 


HINTS  OF  Diana's  experiences  37 

touching  at  the  same  moment  the  heavens  and  Diana's 
heart  —  at  least,  drawing  them  together;  for  she  felt 
exalted,  enraptured,  as  proud  of  her  countrymen  as  of 
their  hero. 

"That's  the  natural  shamrock,  after  the  artificial!  "  she 
heard  Mr.  Redworth  say,  behind  her. 

She  turned  and  sent  one  of  her  brilliant  glances  flying 
over  him,  in  gratitude  for  a  timely  word  well  said.  And 
she  never  forgot  the  remark,  nor  he  the  look. 


CHAPTER  lY 


CONTAINING   HINTS    OF   DIANA's   EXPERIENCES   AND   OP 
WHAT   THEY   LED   TO 

A  FORTNIGHT  after  this  memorable  Ball  the  principal 
actors  of  both  sexes  had  crossed  the  Channel  back  to  Eng- 
land, and  old  Ireland  was  left  to  her  rains  from  above  and 
her  undrained  bogs  below;  her  physical  and  her  mental 
vapours;  her  ailments  and  her  bog-bred  doctors;  as  to 
whom  the  governing  country  trusted  they  would  be  silent 
or  discourse  humorously. 

The  residence  of  Sir  Lukin  Dunstane,  in  the  county  of 
Surrey,  inherited  by  him  during  his  recent  term  of  Indian 
services,  was  on  the  hills,  where  a  day  of  Italian  sky,  or 
better,  a  day  of  our  breezy  South-west,  washed  from  the 
showery  night,  gives  distantly  a  tower  to  view,  and  a 
murky  web,  not  without  colour:  the  ever-flying  banner  of 
the  metropolis,  the  smoke  of  the  city's  chimneys,  if  you 
prefer  plain  language.  At  a  first  inspection  of  the  house, 
Lady  Dunstane  did  not  like  it,  and  it  was  advertized  to  be 
let,  and  the  auctioneer  proclaimed  it  in  his  dialect.  Her 
taste  was  delicate;  she  had  the  sensitiveness  of  an  invalid: 
twice  she  read  the  stalking  advertizement  of  the  attrac- 
tions of  Copsley,  and  hearing  Diana  call  it  "  the  plush  of 
speech,"  she  shuddered;  she  decided  that  a  place  where 
her  husband's  family  had  lived  ought  not  to  stand  forth 
meretriciously  spangled  and  daubed,  like  a  show-booth  at 


38  DIANA   OF  THE   CROSS  WAYS 

a  fair,  for  a  bait;  though  the  grandiloquent  man  of  adver- 
tizing letters  assured  Sir  Lukin  that  a  public  agape  for 
the  big  and  gaudy  mouthful  is  in  no  milder  way  to  be 
caught;  as  it  is  apparently  the  case.  She  withdrew  the 
trumpeting  placard.  Retract  we  likewise  "banner  of  the 
metropolis."  That  plush  of  speech  haunts  all  efforts  to 
swell  and  illuminate  citizen  prose  to  a  princely  poetic. 

Yet  Lady  Dunstane  herself  could  name  the  bank  of 
smoke,  when  looking  North-eastward  from  her  summer- 
house,  the  flag  of  London:  and  she  was  a  person  of  the 
critical  mind,  well  able  to  distinguish  between  the  simple 
metaphor  and  the  superobese.  A  year  of  habitation  in- 
duced her  to  conceal  her  dislike  of  the  place  in  love :  cat's 
love,  she  owned.  Here,  she  confessed  to  Diana,  she  would 
wish  to  live  to  her  end.  It  seemed  remote,  where  an 
invigorating  upper  air  gave  new  bloom  to  her  cheeks ;  but 
she  kept  one  secret  from  her  friend. 

Copsley  was  an  estate  of  nearly  twelve  hundred  acres, 
extending  across  the  ridge  of  the  hills  to  the  slopes  North 
and  South.  Seven  counties  rolled  their  backs  under  this 
commanding  height,  and  it  would  have  tasked  a  pigeon  to 
fly  within  an  hour  the  stretch  of  country  visible  at  the 
Copsley  windows.  Sunrise  to  right,  sunset  leftward,  the 
borders  of  the  grounds  held  both  flaming  horizons.  So 
much  of  the  heavens  and  of  earth  is  rarely  granted  to  a 
dwelling.  The  drawback  was  the  structure,  which  had  no 
charm,  scarce  a  face.  "  It  is  written  that  I  should  live  in 
barracks,"  Lady  Dunstane  said.  The  colour  of  it  taught 
white  to  impose  a  sense  of  gloom.  Her  cat's  love  of  the 
familiar  inside  corners  was  never  able  to  embrace  the  outer 
walls.  Her  sensitiveness,  too,  was  racked  by  the  presen- 
tation of  so  pitiably  ugly  a  figure  to  the  landscape.  She 
likened  it  to  a  coarse-featured  country  wench,  whose  clean- 
ing and  decorating  of  her  countenance  makes  complexion 
grin  and  ruggedness  yawn.  Dirty,  dilapidated,  hung  with 
weeds  and  parasites,  it  would  have  been  more  tolerable. 
She  tried  the  effect  of  various  creepers,  and  they  were  as 
a  staring  paint.  What  it  was  like  then,  she  had  no  heart 
to  say. 

One  may,  however,  fall  on  a  pleasureable  resignation  in 
accepting  great  indemnities,   as  Diana  bade  her  believe, 


HINTS  OF  Diana's  experiences  39 

when  the  first  disgust  began  to  ebb.  "A  good  hundred 
over  there  would  think  it  a  Paradise  for  an  asylum:  "  she 
signified  London.  Her  friend  bore  such  reminders  meekly. 
They  were  readers  of  books  of  all  sorts,  political,  philo- 
sophical, economical,  romantic;  and  they  mixed  the  diverse 
readings  in  thought,  after  the  fashion  of  the  ardently 
youthful.  Romance  affected  politics,  transformed  economy, 
irradiated  philosophy.  They  discussed  the  knotty  ques- 
tion, Why  things  were  not  do7ie,  the  things  being  con- 
fessedly to  do ;  and  they  cut  the  knot.  M  en,  men  calling 
themselves  statesmen,  declined  to  perform  that  operation, 
because,  forsooth,  other  men  objected  to  have  it  performed 
on  them.  And  common  humanity  declared  it  to  be  for 
the  common  weal !  If  so,  then  it  is  clearly  indicated  as  a 
course  of  action :  we  shut  our  eyes  against  logic  and  the 
vaunted  laws  of  economy.  They  are  the  knot  we  cut;  or 
would  cut,  had  we  the  sword.  Diana  did  it  to  the  tune  of 
Garryowen  or  Planxty  Kelly.  0  for  a  despot!  The  cry 
was  for  a  beneficent  despot,  naturally :  a  large-minded  benev- 
olent despot.  In  short,  a  despot  to  obey  their  bidding. 
Thoughtful  young  people  who  think  through  the  heart 
soon  come  to  this  conclusion.  The  heart  is  the  beneficent 
despot  they  would  be.  He  cures  those  miseries;  he  creates 
the  novel  harmony.  He  sees  all  difficulties  through  his 
own  sanguine  hues.  He  is  the  musical  poet  of  the  prob- 
lem, demanding  merely  to  have  it  solved  that  he  may  sing: 
clear  proof  of  the  necessity  for  solving  it  immediately. 

Thus  far  in  their  pursuit  of  methods  for  the  government 
of  a  nation,  to  make  it  happy,  Diana  was  leader.  Her  fine 
ardour  and  resonance,  and  more  than  the  convincing  ring 
of  her  voice,  the  girl's  impassioned  rapidity  in  rushing 
through  any  perceptible  avenue  of  the  labyrinth,  or  beat- 
ing down  obstacles  to  form  one,  and  coming  swiftly  to 
some  solution,  constituted  her  the  chief  of  the  pair  of 
democratic  relDcls  in  questions  that  clamoured  for  instant 
solution.  By  dint  of  reading  solid  writers,  using  the 
brains  they  possessed,  it  was  revealed  to  them  gradually 
that  their  particular  impatience  came  perhaps  of  the  most 
earnest  desire  to  get  to  a  comfortable  termination  of  the 
inquiry:  — the  heart  aching  for  mankind  sought  a  nest  for 
itself.     At  this  point  Lady  Dunstane  took  the  lead.     Diana 


40  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

had  to  be  tugged  to  follow.  She  could  not  accept  a  "  per* 
haps  "  that  cast  dubiousness  on  her  disinterested  champion- 
ship. She  protested  a  perfect  certainty  of  the  single  aim 
of  her  heart  outward.  But  she  reflected.  She  discovered 
that  her  friend  had  gone  ahead  of  her. 

The  discovery  was  reached,  and  even  acknowledged,  be- 
fore she  could  persuade  herself  to  swallow  the  repulsive 
truth.  0  self  !  self !  self !  are  we  eternally  masking  in  a 
domino  that  reveals  your  hideous  old  face  when  we  could 
be  most  positive  we  had  escaped  you  ?  Eternally  !  the 
desolating  answer  knelled.  Nevertheless  the  poor,  the 
starving,  the  overtaxed  in  labour,  they  have  a  right  to  the 
cry  of  Now  !  now  !  They  have  ;  and  if  a  cry  could  conduct 
us  to  the  secret  of  aiding,  healing,  feeding,  elevating  them, 
we  might  swell  the  cry.  As  it  is,  we  must  lay  it  on  our 
wits  patiently  to  track  and  find  the  secret ;  and  meantime 
do  what  the  individual  with  his  poor  pittance  can.  A 
miserable  contribution !  sighed  the  girl.  Old  Self  was 
perceived  in  the  sigh.     She  was  haunted. 

After  all,  one  must  live  one's  life.  Placing  her  on  a 
lower  pedestal  in  her  self-esteem,  the  philosophy  of  youth 
revived  her;  and  if  the  abatement  of  her  personal  pride 
was  dispiriting,  she  began  to  see  an  advantage  in  getting 
inward  eyes. 

*'  It 's  infinitely  better  I  should  know  it,  Emmy  —  I  'm  a 
reptile!  Pleasure  here,  pleasure  there,  I'm  always  think- 
ing of  pleasure.  I  shall  give  up  thinking  and  take  to 
drifting.  Neither  of  us  can  do  more  than  open  purses; 
and  mine 's  lean.  If  the  old  Crossways  had  no  tenant,  it 
would  be  a  purse  all  mouth.  And  charity  is  haunted,  like 
everything  we  do.  Only  I  say  with  my  whole  strength  — 
yes,  I  am  sure,  in  spite  of  the  men  professing  that  they  are 
practical,  the  rich  will  not  move  without  a  goad.  I  have 
and  hold  —  you  shall  hunger  and  covet,  until  you  are 
strong  enough  to  force  my  hand :  —  that 's  the  speech  of 
the  wealthy.  And  they  are  Christians.  In  name.  Well, 
I  thank  heaven  I  'm  at  war  with  myself.'' 

"You  always  manage  to  strike  out  a  sentence  worth 
remembering,  Tony,"  said  Lady  Dunstane.  "  At  war  with 
ourselves,  means  the  best  happiness  we  can  have." 

It  suited  her,  frail  as  her  health  was,  and  her  wisdom 


HINTS  OF  Diana's  experiences  41 

striving  to  the  spiritual  of  happiness.  War  with  herself 
was  far  from  happiness  in  the  bosom  of  Diana.  She 
wanted  external  life,  action,  fields  for  energies,  to  vary  the 
struggle.  It  fretted  and  rendered  her  ill  at  ease.  In  her 
solitary  rides  with  Sir  Lukin  through  a  long  winter  season, 
she  appalled  that  excellent  but  conventionally-minded  gen- 
tleman by  starting,  nay  supporting,  theories  next  to  pro- 
fane in  the  consideration  of  a  land-owner.  She  spoke  of 
Reform :  of  the  Repeal  of  the  Corn  Laws  as  the  simple 
beginning  of  the  grants  due  to  the  people.  She  had  her 
ideas,  of  course,  from  that  fellow  Redworth,  an  occasional 
visitor  at  Copsley ;  and  a  man  might  be  a  donkey  and  think 
what  he  pleased,  since  he  had  a  vocabulary  to  back  his 
opinions.  A  woman.  Sir  Lukin  held,  was  by  nature  a  mute 
in  politics.  Of  the  thing  called  a  Radical  woman,  he  could 
not  believe  that  she  was  less  than  monstrous :  "  with  a 
nose,"  he  said ;  and  doubtless,  horse  teeth,  hatchet  jaws, 
slatternly  in  the  gown,  slipshod,  awful.  As  for  a  girl,  an 
unmarried,  handsome  girl,  admittedly  beautiful,  her  inter- 
jections, echoing  a  man,  were  ridiculous,  and  not  a  little 
annoying  now  and  then,  for  she  could  be  piercingly  sarcas- 
tic. Her  vocabulary  in  irony  was  a  quiverful.  He  ad- 
mired her  and  liked  her  immensely  ;  complaining  only  of 
her  turn  for  unfeminine  topics.  He  pardoned  her  on  the 
score  of  the  petty  difference  rankling  between  them  in 
reference  to  his  abandonment  of  his  Profession,  for  here 
she  was  patriotically  wrong-headed.  Everybody  knew  that 
he  had  sold  out  in  order  to  look  after  his  estates  of  Copsley 
and  Dunena,  secondly :  and  in  the  first  place,  to  nurse  and 
be  a  companion  to  his  wife.  He  had  left  her  but  four 
times  in  five  months ;  he  had  spent  just  three  weeks  of  that 
time  away  from  her  in  London.  No  one  could  doubt  of 
his  having  kept  his  pledge,  although  his  wife  occupied  her- 
self with  books  and  notions  and  subjects  foreign  to  his 
taste  —  his  understanding,  too,  he  owned.  And  Redworth 
had  approved  of  his  retirement,  had  a  contempt  for  soldier- 
ing. "  Quite  as  great  as  yours  for  civilians,  I  can  tell  you," 
Sir  Lukin  said,  dashing  out  of  politics  to  the  vexatious  per- 
sonal subject.     Her  unexpressed  disdain  was  ruffling. 

"  Mr.  Redworth  recommends  work  :  he  respects  the  work* 
ing  soldier,"  said  Diana. 


42  DIANA  OP  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

Sir  Lukin  exclaimed  that  he  had  been  a  working  soldier; 
he  was  ready  to  serve  if  his  country  wanted  him.  He 
directed  her  to  anathematize  Peace,  instead  of  scorning  a 
fellow  for  doing  the  duties  next  about  him :  and  the  men- 
tion of  Peace  fetched  him  at  a  bound  back  to  politics.  He 
quoted  a  distinguished  Tory  orator,  to  the  effect,  that  any 
lengthened  term  of  peace  bred  maggots  in  the  heads  of 
the  people. 

"Mr.  Kedworth  spoke  of  it:  he  translated  something 
from  Aristophanes  for  a  retort,"  said  Diana. 

"  Well,  we  're  friends,  eh  ? "  Sir  Lukin  put  forth  a 
hand. 

She  looked  at  him  surprised  at  the  unnecessary  call  for  a 
show  of  friendship  ;  she  touched  his  hand  with  two  tips  of 
her  fingers,  remarking,  "I  should  think  so,  indeed." 

He  deemed  it  prudent  to  hint  to  his  wife  that  Diana 
Merion  appeared  to  be  meditating  upon  Mr.  Eedworth. 

"  That  is  a  serious  misfortune,  if  true,"  said  Lady 
Dunstane.  She  thought  so  for  two  reasons  :  Mr.  Redworth 
generally  disagreed  in  opinion  with  Diana,  and  contradicted 
her  so  flatly  as  to  produce  the  impression  of  his  not  even 
sharing  the  popular  admiration  of  her  beauty ;  and,  further, 
she  hoped  for  Diana  to  make  a  splendid  marriage.  The 
nibbles  threatened  to  be  snaps  and  bites.  There  had  been 
a  proposal,  in  an  epistle,  a  quaint  effusion,  from  a  gentle- 
man avowing  that  he  had  seen  her  and  had  7iot  danced  with 
her  on  the  night  of  the  Irish  ball.  He  was  rejected,  but 
Diana  groaned  over  the  task  of  replying  to  the  unfortunate 
applicant,  so  as  not  to  wound  him.  "  Shall  I  have  to  do 
this  often,  I  wonder?"  she  said. 

"Unless  you  capitulate,"  said  her  friend. 

Diana's  exclamation :  "  May  I  be  heart-free  for  another 
ten  years ! "  encouraged  Lady  Dunstane  to  suppose  her 
husband  quite  mistaken. 

Li  the  Spring  Diana  went  on  a  first  pilgrimage  to  her 
old  home.  The  Crossways,  and  was  kindly  entertained  by 
the  uncle  and  aunt  of  a  treasured  nephew,  Mr.  Augustus 
Warwick.  She  rode  with  him  on  the  Downs.  A  visit  of 
a  week  humanized  her  view  of  the  intruders.  She  wrote 
almost  tenderly  of  her  host  and  hostess  to  Lady  Dunstane  : 
they  had  but  "the  one  fault  of  spoiling  their  nephew." 


HINTS  OS"  Diana's  experiences  4S 

Him  she  described  as  a  *'  gentlemanly  official/*  a  picture  of 
him.  His  age  was  thirty-four.  He  seemed  "  fond  of  her 
scenery."  Then  her  pen  swept  over  the  Downs  like  a  fly- 
ing horse.  Lady  Dunstane  thought  no  more  of  the  gentle- 
manly official.  He  was  a  barrister  who  did  not  practise  : 
in  nothing  the  man  for  Diana.  Letters  came  from  the 
house  of  the  Pettigrews  in  Kent ;  from  London  ;  from  Hal- 
ford  Manor  in  Hertfordshire;  from  Lockton  Grange  in 
Lincolnshire :  after  which  they  ceased  to  be  the  thrice 
weekly ;  and  reading  the  latest  of  them,  Lady  Dunstane 
imagined  a  flustered  quill.  The  letter  succeeding  the 
omission  contained  no  excuse,  and  it  was  brief.  There 
was  a  strange  interjection,  as  to  the  wearifulness  of  con- 
stantly wandering,  like  a  leaf  off  the  tree.  Diana  spoke 
of  looking  for  a  return  of  the  dear  winter  days  at  Copsley. 
That  was  her  station.  Either  she  must  have  had  some  dis- 
turbing experience,  or  Copsley  was  dear  for  a  Redworth 
reason  thought  the  anxious  peruser;  musing,  dreaming, 
putting  together  divers  shreds  of  correspondence  and  test- 
ing them  with  her  intimate  knowledge  of  Diana's  character, 
Lady  Dunstane  conceived  that  the  unprotected  beautiful 
girl  had  suffered  a  persecution,  it  might  be  an  insult.  She 
spelt  over  the  names  of  the  guests  at  the  houses.  Lord 
Wroxeter  was  of  evil  report :  Captain  E-ampan,  a  Turf 
captain,  had  the  like  notoriety.  And  it  is  impossible  in  a 
great  house  for  the  hostess  to  spread  her  aegis  to  cover 
every  dame  and  damsel  present.  She  has  to  depend  on  the 
women  being  discreet,  the  men  civilized. 

"  How  brutal  men  can  be ! "  was  one  of  Diana's  inci- 
dental remarks,  in  a  subsequent  letter,  relating  simply  to 
masculine  habits.  In  those  days  the  famous  ancestral  plea 
of  "  the  passion  for  his  charmer  "  had  not  been  altogether 
socially  quashed  down  among  the  provinces,  where  the 
bottle  maintained  a  sort  of  sway,  and  the  beauty  which 
inflamed  the  sons  of  men  was  held  to  be  in  coy  expectation 
of  violent  effects  upon  their  boiling  blood.  There  were, 
one  hears  that  there  still  are,  remnants  of  the  pristine 
male,  who,  if  resisted  in  their  suing,  conclude  that  they  are 
scorned,  and  it  infuriates  them  :  some  also  whose  "  passion 
for  the  charmer "  is  an  instinct  to  pull  down  the  standard 
of  the  sex,  by  a  bully  imposition  of  sheer  physical  ascen- 


44  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

dency,  whenever  they  see  it  flying  with  an  air  of  gallant 
independence  :  and  some  who  dedicate  their  lives  to  a  study 
of  the  arts  of  the  Lord  of  Reptiles,  until  they  have  worked 
the  crisis  for  a  display  of  him  in  person.  Assault  or  siege, 
they  have  achieved  their  triumphs ;  they  have  dominated 
a  frailer  system  of  nerves,  and  a  young  woman  without 
father,  or  brother,  or  husband,  to  defend  her,  is  cryingly  a 
weak  one,  therefore  inviting  to  such  an  order  of  heroes. 
Lady  Dunstane  was  quick-witted  and  had  a  talkative  hus- 
band J  she  knew  a  little  of  the  upper  social  world  of  her 
time.  She  was  heartily  glad  to  have  Diana  by  her  side 
again. 

Not  a  word  of  any  serious  experience  was  uttered.  Only 
on  one  occasion  while  they  conversed,  something  being 
mentioned  of  her  tolerance,  a  flush  of  swarthy  crimson  shot 
over  Diana,  and  she  frowned,  with  the  outcry,  "  Oh !  I 
have  discovered  that  I  can  be  a  tigress  ! " 

Her  friend  pressed  her  hand,  saying,  "  The  cause  a  good 
one  ! " 

"Women  have  to  fight.'' 

Diana  said  no  more.  There  had  been  a  bad  experience 
of  her  isolated  position  in  the  world. 

Lady  Dunstane  now  indulged  a  partial  hope  that  Mr. 
Redworth  might  see  in  this  unprotected  beautiful  girl  a 
person  worthy  of  his  esteem.  He  had  his  opportunities, 
and  evidently  he  liked  her.  She  appeared  to  take  more 
cordially  to  him.  She  valued  the  sterling  nature  of  the 
man.  But  they  were  a  hopeless  couple,  they  were  so 
friendly.  Both  ladies  noticed  in  hira  an  abstractedness  of 
look,  often  when  conversing,  as  of  a  man  in  calculation ; 
they  put  it  down  to  an  ambitious  mind.  Yet  Diana  said 
then,  and  said  always,  that  it  was  he  who  had  first  taught 
her  the  art  of  observing.  On  the  whole,  the  brilliant  mar- 
riage seemed  a  fairer  prospect  for  her;  how  reasonable  to 
anticipate,  Lady  Dunstane  often  thought  when  admiring 
the  advance  of  Diana's  beauty  in  queenliness,  for  never  did 
woman  carry  her  head  more  grandly,  more  thrillingly  make 
her  presence  felt;  and  if  only  she  had  been  an  actress 
showing  herself  nightly  on  a  London  stage,  she  would  be- 
fore now  have  met  the  superb  appreciation,  melancholy  to 
reflect  upon ! 


HINTS  OF  Diana's  experiences  4d 

Diana  regained  her  happy  composure  at  Copsley.  She 
had,  as  she  imagined,  no  ambition.  The  duhiess  of  the 
place  conveyed  a  charm  to  a  nature  recovering  from  diS' 
turbance  to  its  clear  smooth  flow.  Air,  light,  books,  and 
her  friend,  these  good  things  she  had ;  they  were  all  she 
wanted.  She  rode,  she  walked,  with  Sir  Lukin  or  Mr. 
Redworth,  for  companion  ;  or  with  Saturday  and  Sunday 
guests,  Lord  Larrian,  her  declared  admirer,  among  them. 
"  Twenty  years  younger  !  "  he  said  to  her,  shrugging,  with 
a  merry  smile  drawn  a  little  at  the  corners  to  sober  sour- 
ness ;  and  she  vowed  to  her  friend  that  she  would  not  have 
had  the  heart  to  refuse  him.  "  Though, "  said  she,  "  speak- 
ing generally,  I  cannot  tell  you  what  a  foreign  animal  a 
husband  would  appear  in  my  kingdom."  Her  experience 
had  wakened  a  sexual  aversion,  of  some  slight  kind,  enough 
to  make  her  feminine  pride  stipulate  for  perfect  indepen- 
dence, that  she  might  have  the  calm  out  of  which  imagina- 
tion spreads  wing.  Imagination  had  become  her  broader 
life,  and  on  such  an  earth,  under  such  skies,  a  husband  who 
is  not  the  fountain  of  it,  certainly  is  a  foreign  animal :  he 
is  a  discordant  note.  He  contracts  the  ethereal  world, 
deadens  radiancy.  He  is  gross  fact,  a  leash,  a  muzzle,  har- 
ness, a  hood,  whatever  is  detestable  to  the  free  limbs  and 
senses.  It  amused  Lady  Dunstane  to  hear  Diana  say,  one 
evening  when  their  conversation  fell  by  hazard  on  her 
future,  that  the  idea  of  a  convent  was  more  welcome  to  her 
than  the  most  splendid  marriage.  "  For,"  she  added,  "  as  I 
am  sure  I  shall  never  know  anything  of  this  love  they 
rattle  about  and  rave  about,  I  shall  do  well  to  keep  to  my 
good  single  path ;  and  I  have  a  warning  within  me  that  a 
step  out  of  it  will  be  a  wrong  one  —  for  me,  dearest !  " 

She  wished  her  view  of  the  yoke  to  be  considered  purely 
personal,  drawn  from  no  examples  and  comparisons.  The 
excellent  Sir  Lukin  was  passing  a  great  deal  of  his  time  in 
London.  His  wife  had  not  a  word  of  blame  for  him  ;  he 
was  a  respectful  husband,  and  attentive  when  present ;  but 
so  uncertain,  owing  to  the  sudden  pressure  of  engagements, 
that  Diana,  hound  on  a  second  visit  to  The  Crossways, 
doubted  whether  she  would  be  able  to  quit  her  friend, 
whose  condition  did  not  allow  of  her  being  left  solitary  at 
Copsley.      He    came    nevertheless   a  day   before   Diana's 


46  DIANA   OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

appointed  departure  on  her  round  of  visits.  She  was 
pleased  with  him,  and  let  him  see  it,  for  the  encouragement 
of  a  husband  in  the  observance  of  his  duties.  One  of  the 
horses  had  fallen  lame,  so  they  went  out  for  a  walk,  at 
Lady  Dunstane's  request.  It  was  a  delicious  afternoon  of 
Spring,  with  the  full  red  disk  of  sun  dropping  behind  the 
brown  beech-twigs.  She  remembered  long  afterward  the 
sweet  simpleness  of  her  feelings  as  she  took  in  the  scent  of 
wild  flowers  along  the  lanes  and  entered  the  woods  —  jaws 
of  another  monstrous  and  blackening  experience.  He  fell 
into  the  sentimental  vein,  and  a  man  coming  from  that 
heated  London  life  to  these  glorified  woods,  might  be  ex- 
cused for  doing  so,  though  it  sounded  to  her  just  a  little 
ludicrous  in  him.  She  played  tolerantly  second  to  it ;  she 
quoted  a  snatch  of  poetry,  and  his  whole  face  was  bent  to 
her,  with  the  petition  that  she  would  repeat  the  verse. 
Much  struck  was  this  giant  ex-dragoon.  Ah !  how  fine  ! 
grand  !  He  would  rather  hear  that  than  any  opera :  it  was 
diviner!  "Yes,  the  best  poetry  is,"  she  assented.  "On 
your  lips,"  he  said.  She  laughed.  "  I  am  not  a  particu- 
larly melodious  reciter."  He  vowed  he  could  listen  to  her 
eternally,  eternally.  His  face,  on  a  screw  of  the  neck  and 
shoulders,  was  now  perpetually  three-quarters  fronting. 
Ah  !  she  was  going  to  leave. —  "  Yes,  and  you  will  find  my 
return  quite  early  enough,"  said  Diana,  stepping  a  trifle 
more  briskly.  His  fist  was  raised  on  the  length  of  the 
arm,  as  if  in  invocation.  "  Not  in  the  whole  of  London  is 
there  a  woman  worthy  to  fasten  your  shoe-buckles !  My 
oath  on  it  !  I  look  ;  I  can't  spy  one."  Such  was  his 
flattering  eloquence. 

She  told  hira  not  to  think  it  necessary  to  pay  her  com- 
pliments. "  And  here,  of  all  places  !  "  They  were  in  the 
heart  of  the  woods.  She  found  her  hand  seized  —  her  waist. 
Even  then,  so  impossible  is  it  to  conceive  the  unimaginable 
even  when  the  apparition  of  it  smites  us,  she  expected  some 
protesting  absurdity,  or  that  he  had  seen  something  in 
her  path.  —  What  did  she  hear  ?  And  from  her  friend's 
husband  ! 

If  stricken  idiotic,  he  was  a  gentleman ;  the  tigress  she 
had  detected  in  her  composition  did  not  require  to  be  called 
forth  J  half-a-dozen  words,  direct,  sharp  as  fangs  and  teeth, 


HINTS  OF  Diana's  expekiences  47 

with  the  eyes  burning  over  them,  sufficed  for  the  work  of 
defence.  —  "  The  man  who  swore  loyalty  to  Emma  !  "  Her 
reproachful  repulsion  of  eyes  was  unmistakable,  withering ; 
as  masterful  as  a  superior  force  on  his  muscles.  —  What 
thing  had  he  been  taking  her  for  ?  —  She  asked  it  within : 
and  he  of  himself,  in  a  reflective  gasp.  Those  eyes  of  hers 
appeared  as  in  a  cloud,  with  the  wrath  above :  she  had  the 
look  of  a  Goddess  in  anger.  He  stammered,  pleaded  across 
her  flying  shoulder  —  Oh  !  horrible,  loathsome,  pitiable  to 
hear  f .  .  .  "A  momentary  aberration  .  .  .  her  beauty 
...  he  deserved  to  be  shot !  .  .  .  could  not  help  admiring 
.  .  .  quite  lost  his  head  ...  on  his  honour !  never  again  !  " 

Once  in  the  roadway,  and  Copsley  visible,  she  checked 
her  arrowy  pace  for  breath,  and  almost  commiserated  the 
dejected  wretch  in  her  thankfulness  to  him  for  silence. 
Nothing  exonerated  him,  but  at  least  he  had  the  grace  not 
to  beg  secresy.  That  would  have  been  an  intolerable  whine 
of  a  poltroon,  adding  to  her  humiliation.  He  abstained ; 
he  stood  at  her  mercy  without  appealing. 

She  was  not  the  woman  to  take  poor  vengeance.  But, 
oh !  she  was  profoundly  humiliated,  shamed  through  and 
through.  The  question,  was  I  guilty  of  any  lightness  — 
anything  to  bring  this  on  me  ?  would  not  be  laid.  And 
how  she  pitied  her  friend  !  This  house,  her  heart's  home, 
was  now  a  wreck  to  her  :  nay,  worse,  a  hostile  citadel. 
The  burden  of  the  task  of  meeting  Emma  with  an  open 
face,  crushed  her  like  very  guilt.  Yet  she  succeeded. 
After  an  hour  in  her  bedchamber  she  managed  to  lock  up 
her  heart  and  summon  the  sprite  of  acting  to  her  tongue 
and  features :  which  ready  attendant  on  the  suffering 
female  host  performed  his  liveliest  throughout  the  evening, 
to  Emma's  amusement,  and  to  the  culprit  ex-dragoon's 
astonishment ;  in  whom,  to  tell  the  truth  of  him,  her 
sparkle  and  fun  kindled  the  sense  of  his  being  less  criminal 
than  he  had  supposed,  with  a  dim  vision  of  himself  as  the 
real  proven  donkey  for  not  having  been  a  harmless  dash 
more  so-  But,  to  be  just  as  well  as  penetrating,  this  was 
only  the  effect  of  her  personal  charm  on  his  nature.  So 
it  spurred  him  a  moment,  when  it  struck  this  doleful 
man  that  to  have  secured  one  kiss  of  those  fresh  and  witty 
sparkling  lips  he  would  endure  forfeits,  pangs,  anything 


48  DIANA   OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

save  the  hanging  of  his  culprit's  head  before  his  Emma. 
Reflection  washed  him  clean.  Secresy  is  not  a  medical 
restorative,  by  no  means  a  good  thing  for  the  baffled 
amorously-adventurous  cavalier,  unless  the  lady's  character 
shall  have  been  firmly  established  in  or  over  his  hazy 
wagging  noddle.  Reflection  informed  him  that  the  honour- 
able, generous,  proud  girl  spared  him  for  the  sake  of  the 
house  she  loved.  After  a  night  of  tossing,  he  rose  right 
heartily  repentant.  He  showed  it  in  the  best  manner,  not 
dramatically.  On  her  accepting  his  offer  to  drive  her  down 
to  the  valley  to  meet  the  coach,  a  genuine  illumination 
of  pure  gratitude  made  a  better  man  of  him,  both  to  look 
at  and  in  feeling.  She  did  not  hesitate  to  consent;  and 
he  had  half  expected  a  refusal.  She  talked  on  the  way 
quite  as  usual,  cheerfully,  if  not  altogether  so  spiritedly. 
A  flash  of  her  matchless  wit  now  and  then  reduced  him  to 
that  abject  state  of  man  beside  the  fair  person  he  has 
treated  high  cavalierly,  which  one  craves  permission  to 
describe  as  pulp.     He  was  utterly  beaten. 

The  sight  of  Redworth  on  the  valley  road  was  a  relief 
to  them  both.  He  had  slept  in  one  of  the  houses  of  the 
valley,  and  spoke  of  having  had  the  intention  to  mount 
to  Copsley.  Sir  Lukin  proposed  to  drive  him  back.  He 
glanced  at  Diana,  still  with  that  calculating  abstract  air 
of  his  ;  and  he  was  rallied.  He  confessed  to  being  absorbed 
in  railways,  the  new  lines  of  railways  projected  to  thread 
the  land  and  fast  mapping  it. 

"  You  've  not  embarked  money  in  them  ?  '^  said  Sir 
Lukin. 

The  answer  was  :  "  I  have ;  all  I  possess.''  And  Redworth 
for  a  sharp  instant  set  his  eyes  on  Diana,  indifferent  to 
Sir  Lukin's  bellow  of  stupefaction  at  such  gambling  on  the 
part  of  a  prudent  fellow. 

He  asked  her  where  she  was  to  be  met,  where  written  to, 
during  the  Summer,  in  case  of  his  wishing  to  send  her 
news. 

She  replied :  "  Copsley  will  be  the  surest.  I  am  always 
in  communication  with  Lady  Dunstane."  She  coloured 
deeply.  The  recollection  of  the  change  of  her  feeling  for 
Copsley  suffused  her  maiden  mind. 

The  strange  blush  prompted  an  impulse  in  Redworth 


THE  SCRUPULOUS   GENTLEMAN  49 

to  speak  to  her  at  ouce  of  his  venture  in  railways.  But 
what  would  she  understand  of  them,  as  connected  with 
the  mighty  stake  he  was  playing  for  ?  He  delayed.  The 
coach  came  at  a  trot  of  the  horses,  admired  by  Sir  Lukin, 
round  a  corner.  She  entered  it,  her  maid  followed,  the  door 
banged,  the  horses  trotted.     She  was  off. 

Her  destiny  of  the  Crossways  tied  a  knot,  barred  a  gate, 
and  pointed  to  a  new  direction  of  the  road  on  that  fine 
spring  morning,  when  beech-buds  were  near  the  burst, 
cowslips  yellowed  the  meadow-flats,  and  skylarks  quivered 
upward. 

For  many  long  years  Redworth  had  in  his  memory,  for  a 
comment  on  procrastination  and  excessive  scrupulousness 
in  his  calculating  faculty,  the  blue  back  of  a  coach. 

He  declined  the  vacated  place  beside  Sir  Lukin,  promis- 
ing to  come  and  spend  a  couple  of  daj's  at  Copsley  in  a 
fortnight  —  Saturday  week.  He  wanted,  he  said,  to  have 
a  talk  with  Lady  Dunstane.  Evidently  he  had  railways 
on  the  brain,  and  Sir  Lukin  warned  his  wife  to  be  guarded 
against  the  speculative  mania,  and  advise  the  man,  if  she 
could. 


CHAPTER  V 

CONCERNING  THE   SCRUPULOUS    GENTLEMAN   WHO   CAME 

TOO    LATE 

On  the  Saturday  of  his  appointment  Redworth  arrived  at 
Copsley,  with  a  shade  deeper  of  the  calculating  look  under 
his  thick  brows,  habitual  to  him  latterly.  He  found  Lady 
Dunstane  at  her  desk,  pen  in  hand,  the  paper  untouched ; 
and  there  was  an  appearance  of  trouble  about  her  somewhat 
resembling  his  own,  as  he  would  have  observed,  had  he 
been  open-minded  enough  to  notice  anything,  except  that 
she  was  writing  a  letter.  He  begged  her  to  continue  it; 
he  proposed  to  read  a  book  till  she  was  at  leisure. 

"I  have  to  write,  and  scarcely  know  how,"  said  she, 
clearing  her  face  to  make  the  guest  at  home,  and  taking  a 
chair  by  the  fire,  "  I  would  rather  chat  for  half  an  hour." 

4 


50  DIANA  OF  THE   CKOSSWAYS 

She  spoke  of  the  weather,  frosty,  but  tonic ;  bad  for  the 
last  days  of  hunting,  good  for  the  farmer  and  the  country, 
let  us  hope. 

Kedworth  nodded  assent.  It  might  be  surmised  that  he 
was  brooding  over  those  railways,  in  which  he  had  embarked 
his  fortune.  Ah !  those  railways  !  She  was  not  long  coming 
to  the  wailful  exclamation  upon  them,  both  to  express  her 
personal  sorrow  at  the  disfigurement  of  our  dear  England, 
and  lead  to  a  little,  modest  offering  of  a  woman's  counsel 
to  the  rash  adventurer  ;  for  thus  could  she  serviceably  put 
aside  her  perplexity  awhile.  Those  railways !  When 
would  there  be  peace  in  the  land  ?  Where  one  single  nook 
of  shelter  and  escape  from  them  !  And  the  English,  blunt 
as  their  senses  are  to  noise  and  hubbub,  would  be  revelling 
in  hisses,  shrieks,  puffings  and  screeches,  so  that  travelling 
would  become  an  intolerable  afSiction.  "I  speak  rather  as 
an  invalid,"  she  admitted;  "I  conjure  up  all  sorts  of 
horrors,  the  whistle  in  the  night  beneath  one's  windows, 
and  the  smoke  of  trains  defacing  the  landscape ;  hideous 
accidents  too.  They  will  be  wholesale  and  past  help. 
Imagine  a  collision!  I  have  borne  many  changes  with 
equanimity,  I  pretend  to  a  certain  degree  of  philosophy, 
but  this  mania  for  cutting  up  the  land  does  really  cause  me 
to  pity  those  who  are  to  follow  us.  They  will  not  see  the 
England  we  have  seen.  It  will  be  patched  and  scored, 
disfigured  .  .  .  a  sort  of  barbarous  Maori  visage  —  England 
in  a  New  Zealand  mask.  You  may  call  it  the  sentimental 
view.  In  this  case,  I  am  decidedly  sentimental :  I  love  my 
country.  I  do  love  quiet,  rural  England.  Well,  and  I  love 
beauty,  I  love  simplicity.  All  that  will  be  destroyed  by  the 
refuse  of  the  towns  flooding  the  land  —  barring  accidents, 
as  Lukin  says.     There  seems  nothing  else  to  save  us." 

Redworth  acquiesced.     "  Nothing." 

"And  you  do  not  regret  it  ?  "  he  was  asked. 

"  Not  a  bit.  We  have  already  exchanged  opinions  on 
the  subject.  Simplicity  must  go,  and  the  townsman  meet 
his  equal  in  the  countryman.  As  for  beauty,  I  would 
sacrifice  that  to  circulate  gumption.  A  bushelful  of  non- 
sense is  talked  pro  and  con  :  it  always  is  at  an  innovation. 
What  we  are  now  doing,  is  to  take  a  longer  and  a  quicker 
stride,  that  is  all." 


THE   SCRUPULOUS    GENTLEMAl^  51 

"And  establishing  a  new  field  for  the  speculator/ 

"  Yes,  and  I  am  one,  and  this  is  the  matter  I  wanted  to 
discuss  with  you,  Lady  Dunstane,"  said  Redworth,  bending 
forward,  the  whole  man  devoted  to  the  point  of  business. 

She  declared  she  was  complimented ;  she  felt  the  com- 
pliment, and  trusted  her  advice  might  be  useful,  faintly 
remarking  that  she  had  a  woman's  head ;  and  "  not  less  " 
was  implied  as  much  as  "not  more,"  in  order  to  give 
strength  to  her  prospective  opposition. 

All  his  money,  she  heard,  was  down  on  the  railway  table. 
He  might  within  a  year  have  a  tolerable  fortune:  and,  of 
course,  he  might  be  ruined.  He  did  not  expect  it;  still  he 
fronted  the  risks.  '^  And  now,"  said  he,  "  I  come  to  you 
for  counsel.  I  am  not  held  among  my  acquaintances  to  be 
a  marrying  man,  as  it 's  called." 

He  paused.  Lady  Dunstane  thought  it  an  occasion  to 
praise  him  for  his  considerateness. 

"You  involve  no  one  but  yourself,  you  mean?"  Her 
eyes  shed  approval.  "  Still  the  day  may  come.  ...  I  say 
only  that  it  may :  and  the  wish  to  marry  is  a  rosy  colouring 
.  .  .  equal  to  a  flying  chariot  in  conducting  us  across  diffi- 
culties and  obstructions  to  the  deed.  And  then  one  may 
have  to  regret  a  previous  rashness." 

These  practical  men  are  sometimes  obtuse :  she  dwelt  on 
that  vision  of  the  future. 

He  listened,  and  resumed  :  "  My  view  of  marriage  is,  that 
no  man  should  ask  a  woman  to  be  his  wife  unless  he  is 
well  able  to  support  her  in  the  comforts,  not  to  say  luxuries, 
she  is  accustomed  to."  His  gaze  had  wandered  to  the  desk ; 
it  fixed  there.     "  That  is  Miss  Merion's  writing,"  he  said. 

"The  letter?"  said  Lady  Dunstane,  and  she  stretched 
out  her  hand  to  press  down  a  leaf  of  it.  "  Yes  ;  it  is  from 
her." 

"  Is  she  quite  well  ?  " 

"'  I  suppose  she  is.     She  does  not  speak  of  her  health." 

He  looked  pertinaciously  in  the  direction  of  the  letter, 
and  it  was  not  rightly  mannered.  That  letter,  of  all  others, 
was  covert  and  sacred  to  the  friend.  It  contained  the 
weightiest  of  secrets. 

"  I  have  not  written  to  her,"  said  Redworth. 

He  was   astonishing:     "To   whom?     To  Diana?    You 


52  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

could  very  well  have  done  so,  only  I  fancy  she  knows 
nothing,  has  never  given  a  thought  to  railway  stocks  and 
shares;  she  has  a  loathing  for  speculation." 

"  And  speculators  too,  I  dare  say.'' 

"  It  is  extremely  probable."  Lady  Dunstane  spoke  with 
an  emphasis,  for  the  man  liked  Diana,  and  would  be  moved 
by  the  idea  of  forfeiting  her  esteem. 

"  She  might  blame  me  if  I  did  anything  dishonourable." 

"  She  certainly  would." 

"  She  will  have  no  cause." 

Lady  Dunstane  began  to  look,  as  at  a  cloud  charged  with 
remote  explosions  :  and  still  for  the  moment  she  was  un- 
suspecting. But  it  was  a  flitting  moment.  When  he  went 
on,  and  very  singularly  droning  to  her  ear :  "  The  more  a 
man  loves  a  woman,  the  more  he  should  be  positive,  before 
asking  her,  that  she  will  not  have  to  consent  to  a  loss  of 
position,  and  I  would  rather  lose  her  than  fail  to  give  her 
all  —  not  be  sure,  as  far  as  a  man  can  be  sure,  of  giving 
her  all  I  think  she  's  worthy  of :  "  then  the  cloud  shot  a 
lightning  flash,  and  the  doors  of  her  understanding  swung 
wide  to  the  entry  of  a  great  wonderment.  A  shock  of  pain 
succeeded  it.  Her  sympathy  was  roused  so  acutely  that 
she  slipped  over  the  reflective  rebuke  she  would  have  ad- 
dressed to  her  silly  delusion  concerning  his  purpose  in 
speaking  of  his  affairs  to  a  woman.  Though  he  did  not 
mention  Diana  by  name,  Diana  was  clearly  the  person.  And 
why  had  he  delayed  to  speak  to  her  ?  —  Because  of  this 
venture  of  his  money  to  make  him  a  fortune,  for  the  assur- 
ance of  her  future  comfort !  Here  was  the  best  of  men  for 
the  girl,  not  displeasing  to  her  ;  a  good,  strong,  trustworthy 
man,  pleasant  to  hear  and  to  see,  only  erring  in  being  a  trifle 
too  scrupulous  in  love  :  and  a  fortnight  back  she  would  have 
imagined  he  had  no  chance  ;  and  now  she  knew  that  the 
chance  was  excellent  in  those  days,  with  this  revelation  in 
Diana's  letter,  which  said  that  all  chance  was  over. 

"  The  courtship  of  a  woman,"  he  droned  away,  "  is  in  my 
mind  not  fair  to  her  until  a  man  has  to  the  full  enough 
to  sanction  his  asking  her  to  marry  him.  And  if  he  throws 
all  he  possesses  on  a  stake  ...  to  win  her  —  give  her  what 
she  has  a  right  to  claim,  he  ought.  .  .  .  Only  at  present 
the  prospect  seems  good  .  .  .  He  ought  of  course  to  wait. 


THE   SCRUPULOUS   GENTLEMAN  53 

Well,  the  value  of  the  stock  I  hold  has  doubled,  and  it  in- 
creases. I  am  a  careful  watcher  of  the  market.  I  have 
friends  —  brokers  and  railway  Directors.  I  can  rely  on 
them." 

"  Pray,"  interposed  Lady  Dunstane,  "  specify  —  I  am 
rather  in  a  mist  —  the  exact  point  upon  which  you  do  me 
the  honour  to  consult  me."  She  ridiculed  herself  for  having 
imagined  that  such  a  man  would  come  to  consult  her  upon 
a  point  of  business. 

"  It  is,"  he  replied,  "  this  :  whether,  as  affairs  now  stand 
with  me  —  I  have  an  income  from  my  office,  and  personal 
property  .  .  .  say  between  thirteen  and  fourteen  hundred  a 
year  to  start  with  —  whether  you  think  me  justified  in  ask- 
ing a  lady  to  share  my  lot  ?  " 

"  Why  not  ?     But  Avill  you  name  the  lady  ?  " 

"Then  I  may  write  at  once?  In  your  judgement  .  .  . 
■^es,  the  lady.  I  have  not  named  her.  I  had  no  right. 
Besides,  the  general  question  first,  in  fairness  to  the  peti- 
tioner. You  might  reasonably  stipulate  for  more  for  a 
friend.  She  could  make  a  match,  as  you  have  said  .  .  ."  he 
muttered  of  ^'brilliant,"  and  "the  highest;"  and  his 
humbleness  of  the  honest  man  enamoured  touched  Lady 
Dunstane.  She  saw  him  now  as  the  man  of  strength  that 
she  would  have  selected  from  a  thousand  suitors  to  guide 
her  dear  friend. 

She  caught  at  a  straw :   "  Tell  me,  it  is  not  Diana  ?  " 

"  Diana  Merion  ! " 

As  soon  as  he  had  said  it  he  perceived  pity,  and  he  drew 
himself  tight  for  the  stroke.  "She's  in  love  with  some 
one  ?  " 

"  She  is  engaged." 

He  bore  it  well.  He  was  a  big-chested  fellow,  and  that 
excruciating  twist  within  of  the  revolution  of  the  wheels  of 
the  brain  snapping  their  course  to  grind  the  contrary  to 
that  of  the  heart,  was  revealed  in  one  short  lift  and  gasp,  a 
compression  of  the  tremendous  change  he  underwent. 

"  Why  did  you  not  speak  before  ?  "  said  Lady  Dunstane. 
Her  words  were  tremulous. 

"  I  should  have  had  no  justification." 

"  You  might  have  won  her !  "  She  could  have  wept ; 
her  sympathy  and  her  self-condolence  under  disappoint' 


64  DIAKA  OP  l^HE  CEOSSWAYS 

ment  at  Diana's  conduct  joined  to  swell  the  feminine 
flood. 

The  poor  fellow's  quick  breathing  and  blinking  reminded 
her  of  cruelty  in  a  retrospect.  She  generalized,  to  ease  her 
spirit  of  regret,  by  hinting  it  without  hurting:  "Women 
really  are  not  puppets.  They  are  not  so  excessively 
luxurious.  It  is  good  for  young  women  in  the  early  days 
of  marriage  to  rough  it  a  little.'-  She  found  herself 
droning,  as  he  had  done. 

He  had  ears  for  nothing  but  the  fact. 

"Then  lam  too  late!" 

"I  have  heard  it  to-day." 

"She  is  engaged!     Positively?" 

Lady  Dunstane  glanced  backward  at  the  letter  on  her 
desk.  She  had  to  answer  the  strangest  of  letters  that  had 
ever  come  to  her,  and  it  was  from  her  dear  Tony,  the 
baldest  intimation  of  the  weightiest  piece  of  intelligence 
which  a  woman  can  communicate  to  her  heart's  friend. 
The  task  of  answering  it  was  now  doubled.  "  I  fear  so, 
I  fancy  so,"  she  said,  and  she  longed  to  cast  eye  over  the 
letter  again ,  to  see  if  there  might  possibly  be  a  loophole 
behind  the  lines. 

"Then  I  must  make  my  mind  up  to  it,"  said  Eedworth, 
"I  think  I '11  take  a  walk." 

She  smiled  kindly.     "It  will  be  our  secret." 

"I  thank  you  with  all  my  heart,  Lady  Dunstane." 

He  was  not  a  weaver  of  phrases  in  distress.  His  blunt 
reserve  was  eloquent  of  it  to  her,  and  she  liked  him  the 
better;  could  have  thanked  him  too  for  leaving  her 
promptly. 

When  she  was  alone  she  took  in  the  contents  of  the  letter 
at  a  hasty  glimpse.  It  was  of  one  paragraph ,  and  fired  its 
shot  like  a  cannon  with  the  muzzle  at  her  breast :  — 

"  My  own  Emmy,  —  I  have  been  asked  in  marriage  by 
Mr.  Warwick,  and  have  accepted  him.  Signify  your 
approval,  for  I  have  decided  that  it  is  the  wisest  thing  a 
waif  can  do.  We  are  to  live  at  The  Crossways  for  four 
months  of  the  year,  so  I  shall  have  Dada  in  his  best  days 
and  all  my  youngest  dreams,  my  sunrise  and  morning  dew, 
surrounding  me;  my  old  home  for  my  new  one.     I  write 


THE   SCKUPULOUS   GENTLEMAN  55 

in  haste,  to  you  first,  burning  to  hear  from  you.  Send 
your  blessing  to  yours  in  life  and  death,  through  all 
transformations, 

"Tony." 

That  was  all.  Not  a  word  of  the  lover  about  to  be  deco- 
rated with  the  title  of  husband.  No  confession  of  love, 
nor  a  single  supplicating  word  to  her  friend,  in  excuse 
for  the  abrupt  decision  to  so  grave  a  step.  Her  previous 
description  of  him,  as  a  "  gentlemanly  official "  in  his 
appearance,  conjured  him  up  most  distastefully.  True, 
she  might  have  made  a  more  lamentable  choice;  —  a  silly 
lordliug,  or  a  hero  of  scandals ;  but  if  a  gentlemanly  official 
was  of  stabler  mould,  he  failed  to  harmonize  quite  so  well 
with  the  idea  of  a  creature  like  Tony.  Perhaps  Mr.  Ked- 
worth  also  failed  in  something.  Where  was  the  man  fitly 
to  mate  her!  Mr.  Redworth,  however,  was  manly  and 
trustworthy,  of  the  finest  Saxon  type  in  build  and  in  char- 
acter. He  had  great  qualities,  and  his  excess  of  scrupu- 
lousness was  most  pitiable. 

She  read:  "The  wisest  thing  a  waif  can  do."  It  bore  a 
sound  of  desperation.  Avowedly  Tony  had  accepted  him 
without  being  in  love.  Or  was  she  masking  the  passion? 
No:  had  it  been  a  case  of  love,  she  would  have  written 
very  differently  to  her  friend. 

Lady  Dunstane  controlled  the  pricking  of  the  wound 
inflicted  by  Diana's  novel  exercise  in  laconics  where  the 
fullest  flow  was  due  to  tenderness,  and  despatched  felici- 
tations upon  the  text  of  the  initial  line:  "Wonders  are 
always  happening."  She  wrote  to  hide  vexation  beneath 
surprise;  naturally  betraying  it.  "I  must  hope  and  pray 
that  you  have  not  been  precipitate."  Her  curiosity  to 
inspect  the  happiest  of  men,  the  most  genuine  part  of  her 
letter,  was  expressed  coldly.  When  she  had  finished  the 
composition  she  perused  it,  and  did  not  recognize  herself 
in  her  language,  though  she  had  been  so  guarded  to  cover 
the  wound  her  Tony  dealt  their  friendship  —  in  some  degree 
injuring  their  sex.  For  it  might  now,  after  such  an 
example,  verily  seem  that  women  are  incapable  of  a  trans- 
lucent perfect  confidence :  —  their  impulses,  caprices,  des- 
perations,    tricks    of    concealment,    trip    a    heart-whole 


66  DIAKA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

friendship.  Well,  to-morrow,  if  not  to-day,  the  tripping 
may  be  expected!  Lady  Dunstane  resigned  herself  sadly 
to  a  lowered  view  of  her  Tony's  character.  This  was  her 
unconscious  act  of  reprisal.  Her  brilliant  beloved  Tony, 
dazzling  but  in  beauty  and  the  gifted  mind,  stood  as  one 
essentially  with  the  common  order  of  women.  She  wished 
to  be  settled,  Mr.  Warwick  proposed,  and  for  the  sake  of 
living  at  The  Crossways  she  accepted  him  —  she,  the  lofty 
scorner  of  loveless  marriages !  who  had  said  —  how  many 
times!  that  nothing  save  love  excused  it!  She  degraded 
their  mutual  high  standard  of  womankind.  Diana  was  in 
eclipse,  full  three  parts.  The  bulk  of  the  gentlemanly 
official  she  had  chosen  obscured  her.  But  I  have  written 
very  carefully,  thought  Lady  Dunstane,  dropping  her 
answer  into  the  post-bag.  She  had,  indeed,  been  so  care- 
ful, that  to  cloak  her  feelings,  she  had  written  as  another 
person.  Women  with  otiose  husbands  have  a  task  to 
preserve  friendship. 

Redworth  carried  his  burden  through  the  frosty  air  at  a 
pace  to  melt  icicles  in  Greenland.  He  walked  unthink- 
ingly, right  ahead,  to  the  red  West,  as  he  discovered  when 
pausing  to  consult  his  watch.  Time  was  left  to  return  at 
the  same  pace  and  dress  for  dinner;  he  swung  round  and 
picked  up  remembrances  of  sensations  he  had  strewn  by 
the  way.  She  knew  these  woods;  he  was  walking  in  her 
footprints;  she  was  engaged  to  be  married.  Yes,  his  prin- 
ciple, never  to  ask  a  woman  to  marry  him,  never  to  court 
her,  without  bank-book  assurance  of  his  ability  to  sup- 
port her  in  cordial  comfort,  was  right.  He  maintained 
it,  and  owned  himself  a  donkey  for  having  stuck  to  it. 
Between  him  and  his  excellent  principle  there  was  war, 
without  the  slightest  division.  Warned  of  the  danger  of 
losing  her,  he  would  have  done  the  same  again,  confessing 
himself  donkey  for  his  pains.  The  principle  was  right, 
because  it  was  due  to  the  woman.  His  rigid  adherence  to 
the  principle  set  him  belabouring  his  donkey-ribs,  as  the 
proper  due  to  himself.  For  he  might  have  had  a  chance, 
all  through  two  Winters.  The  opportunities  had  been 
numberless.  Here,  in  this  beech  wood;  near  that  thorn- 
bush  ;  on  the  juniper  slope ;  from  the  corner  of  chalk  and 
sand  in  junction,  to  the  corner  of  clay  and  chalk;  all  the 


THE   SCRUPULOUS   GENTLEMAN  57 

length  of  the  wooded  ridge  he  had  reminders  of  her 
presence  and  his  priceless  chances :  and  still  the  standard 
of  his  conduct  said  No,  while  his  heart  bled. 

He  felt  that  a  chance  had  been.  More  sagacious  than 
Lady  Dunstane,  from  his  not  nursing  a  wound,  he  divined 
in  the  abruptness  of  Diana's  resolution  to  accept  a  suitor, 
a  sober  reason,  and  a  iitting  one,  for  the  wish  that  she 
might  be  settled.  And  had  he  spoken!  —  If  he  had  spoken 
to  her,  she  might  have  given  her  hand  to  him,  to  a  dis- 
honourable brute!  A  blissful  brute.  But  a  worse  than 
donkey.  Yes,  his  principle  was  right,  and  he  lashed  with 
it,  and  prodded  with  it,  drove  himself  out  into  the  sour 
wilds  where  bachelordom  crops  noxious  weeds  without  a 
hallowing  luminary,  and  clung  to  it,  bruised  and  bleeding 
though  he  was. 

The  gentleness  of  Lady  Dunstane  soothed  him  during 
the  term  of  a  visit  that  was  rather  like  purgatory  sweet- 
ened by  angelical  tears.  He  was  glad  to  go,  wretched  in 
having  gone.  She  diverted  the  incessant  conflict  between 
his  insubordinate  self  and  his  castigating,  but  avowedly 
sovereign,  principle.  Away  from  her,  he  was  the  victim 
of  a  flagellation  so  dire  that  it  almost  drove  him  to  revolt 
against  the  lord  he  served,  and  somehow  the  many  mem- 
ories at  Copsley  kept  him  away.  Sir  Lukin,  when  speak- 
ing of  Diana's  "engagement  to  that  fellow  Warwick," 
exalted  her  with  an  extraordinary  enthusiasm,  exceedingly 
hard  for  the  silly  beast  who  had  lost  her  to  bear.  For  the 
present  the  place  dearest  to  Eedworth  of  all  places  on  earth 
was  unendurable. 

Meanwhile  the  value  of  railway  investments  rose  in  the 
market,  fast  as  asparagus-heads  for  cutting:  a  circum- 
stance that  added  stings  to  reflection.  Had  he  been  only 
a  little  bolder,  a  little  less  the  fanatical  devotee  of  his  rule 
of  masculine  honour,  less  the  slave  to  the  letter  of  success. 
.  .  .  But  why  reflect  at  all?  Here  was  a  goodly  income 
approaching,  perhaps  a  seat  in  Parliament;  a  station  for 
the  airing  of  his  opinions  —  and  a  social  status  for  the 
wife  now  denied  to  him.  The  wife  was  denied  to  him ;  he 
could  conceive  of  no  other.  The  tyrant-ridden,  reticent, 
tenacious  creature  had  thoroughly  wedded  her  in  mind; 
her  view  of  things  had  a  throne  beside  his  own,  even  in 


58  DIAKA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

their  differences.  He  perceived,  agreeing  or  disagreeing, 
the  motions  of  her  brain,  as  he  did  with  none  other  of 
women;  and  this  it  is  which  stamps  character  on  her, 
divides  her  from  them,  upraises  and  enspheres.  He 
declined  to  live  with  any  other  of  the  sex. 

Before  he  could  hear  of  the  sort  of  man  Mr.  Warwick 
was  —  a  perpetual  object  of  his  quest  —  the  bridal  bells 
had  rung,  and  Diana  Antonia  Merion  lost  her  maiden 
name.  She  became  the  Mrs.  Warwick  of  our  footballing 
world. 

Why  she  married,  she  never  told.  Possibly,  in  amaze- 
ment at  herself  subsequently,  she  forgot  the  specific  reason. 
That  which  weighs  heavily  in  youth,  and  commits  us  to 
desperate  action,  will  be  a  trifle  under  older  eyes  to  blun- 
ter senses,  a  more  enlightened  understanding.  Her  friend 
Emma  probed  for  the  reason  vainly.  It  was  partly  revealed 
to  Redworth,  by  guess-work  and  a  putting  together  of 
pieces,  yet  quite  luminously,  as  it  were  by  touch  of  ten- 
tacle-feelers—  one  evening  that  he  passed  with  Sir  Lukin 
Dunstane,  when  the  lachrymose  ex-dragoon  and  son  of 
Idlesse,  had  rather  more  than  dined. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE   COUPLE 


Six  months  a  married  woman,  Diana  came  to  Copsley  to 
introduce  her  husband.  They  had  run  over  Italy:  "the 
Italian  Peninsula,"  she  quoted  him  in  a  letter  to  Lady 
Dunstane:  and  were  furnishing  their  London  house.  Her 
first  letters  from  Italy  appeared  to  have  a  little  bloom  of 
sentiment.  Augustus  was  mentioned  as  liking  this  and 
that  in  the  land  of  beauty.  He  patronized  Art,  and  it  was 
a  pleasure  to  hear  him  speak  upon  pictures  and  sculptures; 
he  knew  a  great  deal  about  them.  "He  is  an  authority." 
Her  humour  soon  began  to  play  round  the  fortunate  man, 
who  did  not  seem,  to  the  reader's  mind,  to  bear  so  well  a 
sentimental  clothing.     His  pride  was  in  being  very  English 


THE  COUPLE  69 

on  the  Continent,  and  Diana's  instances  of  his  lofty  appre- 
ciations of  the  garden  of  Art  and  Nature,  and  statuesque 
walk  through  it,  would  have  been  more  amusing  if  her 
friend  could  have  harmonized  her  idea  of  the  couple.  A 
description  of  "  a  bit  of  a  wrangle  between  us  "  at  Lucca, 
where  an  Italian  post-master  on  a  journey  of  inspection, 
claimed  a  share  of  their  carriage  and  audaciously  attempted 
entry,  was  laughable,  but  jarred.  Would  she  some  day 
lose  her  relish  for  ridicule,  and  see  him  at  a  distance? 
He  was  generous,  Diana  said:  she  saw  fine  qualities  in 
him.  It  might  be  that  he  was  lavish  on  his  bridal  tour. 
She  said  he  was  unselfish,  kind,  affable  with  his  equals; 
he  was  cordial  to  the  acquaintances  he  met.  Perhaps  his 
worst  fault  was  an  affected  superciliousness  before  the 
foreigner,  not  uncommon  in  those  days.  "You  are  to 
know,  dear  Emmy,  that  we  English  are  the  aristocracy  of 
Europeans."  Lady  Dunstane  inclined  to  think  we  were; 
nevertheless,  in  the  mouth  of  a  "  gentlemanly  official "  the 
frigid  arrogance  added  a  stroke  of  caricature  to  his  deport- 
ment. On  the  other  hand,  the  reports  of  him  gleaned  by 
Sir  Lukin  sounded  favourable.  He  was  not  taken  to  be 
preternaturally  stiff,  nor  bright,  but  a  goodish  sort  of  fel- 
low; good  horseman,  good  shot,  good  character.  In  short, 
the  average  Englishman,  excelling  as  a  cavalier,  a  slayer, 
and  an  orderly  subject.  That  was  a  somewhat  elevated 
standard  to  the  patriotic  Emma.  Only  she  would  never 
have  stipulated  for  an  average  to  espouse  Diana.  Would 
he  understand  her,  and  value  the  best  in  her?  Another 
and  unanswered  question  was,  how  could  she  have  conde- 
scended to  wed  with  an  average?  There  was  transparently 
some  secret  not  confided  to  her  friend. 

He  appeared.  Lady  Dunstane's  first  impression  of  him 
recurred  on  his  departure.  Her  unanswered  question 
drummed  at  her  ears,  though  she  remembered  that  Tony's 
art  in  leading  him  out  had  moderated  her  rigidly  judicial 
summary  of  the  union  during  a  greater  part  of  the  visit. 
But  his  requiring  to  be  led  out,  was  against  him.  Con- 
sidering the  subjects,  his  talk  was  passable.  The  subjects 
treated  of  politics,  pictures.  Continental  travel,  our  manu- 
factures, our  wealth  and  the  reasons  for  it  —  excellent 
reasons   well-weighed.     He    was   handsome,    as   men   goj 


60  DIAKA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

rather  tall,  not  too  stout,  precise  in  the  modern  fashion  of 
his  dress,  and  the  pair  of  whiskers  encasing  a  colourless 
depression  up  to  a  long,  thin,  straight  nose,  and  closed 
lips  indicating  an  aperture.  The  contraction  of  his  mouth 
expressed  an  intelligence  in  the  attitude  of  the  firmly 
negative.  The  lips  opened  to  smile,  the  teeth  were  fault- 
less :  an  effect  was  produced,  if  a  cold  one  —  the  colder  for 
the  unparticipating  northern  eyes ;  eyes  of  that  half  clcud 
and  blue,  which  make  a  kind  of  hueless  grey,  and  are 
chiefly  striking  in  an  authoritative  stare.  Without  con- 
tradicting, for  he  was  exactly  polite,  his  look  signified  a 
person  conscious  of  being  born  to  command:  in  fine,  an 
aristocrat  among  the  "aristocracy  of  Europeans."  His 
differences  of  opinion  were  prefaced  by  a  "Pardon  me," 
and  pausing  smile  of  the  teeth;  then  a  succinctly  worded 
sentence  or  two,  a  perfect  settlement  of  the  dispute.  He 
disliked  argumentation.  He  said  so,  and  Diana  remarked 
it  of  him,  speaking  as  a  wife  who  merely  noted  a  character- 
istic. Inside  his  boundary,  he  had  neat  phrases,  opiniors 
in  packets.  Beyond  it,  apparently  the  world  was  void  of 
any  particular  interest.  Sir  Lukin,  whose  boundary  would 
have  shown  a  narrower  limitation  had  it  been  defined, 
stood  no  chance  with  him.  Tory  versus  Whig,  he  tried 
a  wrestle,  and  was  thrown.  They  agreed  on  the  topic  of 
Wine.  Mr.  Warwick  had  a  fine  taste  in  wine.  Their 
after-dinner  sittings  were  devoted  to  this  and  the  allitera- 
tive cognate  theme,  equally  dear  to  the  gallant  ex-dragoon, 
from  which  it  resulted  that  Lady  Dunstane  received  sat- 
isfactory information  in  a  man's  judgement  of  him. 
"  Warwick  is  a  clever  fellow,  and  a  thorough  man  of  the 
world,  I  can  tell  you,  Emmy."  Sir  Lukin  further  observed 
that  he  was  a  gentlemanly  fellow.  "A  gentlemanly  offi- 
cial!" Diana's  primary  dash  of  portraiture  stuck  to  him, 
so  true  it  was !  As  for  her,  she  seemed  to  have  forgotten 
it.  Not  only  did  she  strive  to  show  him  to  advantage  by 
leading  him  out;  she  played  second  to  him,  subserviently, 
fondly;  she  quite  submerged  herself,  content  to  be  dull  if 
he  might  shine;  and  her  talk  of  her  husband  in  her  friend's 
blue-chamber  boudoir  of  the  golden  stars,  where  they  had 
discussed  the  world  and  taken  counsel  in  her  maiden  days, 
implied  admiration  of  his  merits.     He  rode  superbly :  he 


THE  COUPLE 


61  ♦ 


knew  Law:  he  was  prepared  for  any  position:  he  could 
speak  really  eloquently;  she  had  heard  him  at  a  local 
meeting.  And  he  loved  the  old  Crossways  almost  as  much 
as  she  did.  "  He  has  promised  me  he  will  never  ask  me 
to  sell  it,"  she  said,  with  a  simpleness  that  could  hardly 
have  been  acted. 

When  she  was  gone,  Lady  Dunstane  thought  she  had 
worn  a  mask,  in  the  natural  manner  of  women  trying  to 
make  the  best  of  their  choice;  and  she  excused  her  poor 
Tony  for  the  artful  presentation  of  him  at  her  own  cost. 
But  she  could  not  excuse  her  for  having  married  the  man. 
Her  first  and  her  final  impression  likened  him  to  a  house 
locked  up  and  empty :  —  a  London  house  conventionally 
furnished  and  decorated  by  the  upholsterer,  and  empty  of 
inhabitants.  How  a  brilliant  and  beautiful  girl  could  have 
committed  this  rashness,  was  the  perplexing  riddle:  the 
knottier  because  the  man  was  idle :  and  Diana  had  ambi- 
tion; she  despised  and  dreaded  idleness  in  men.  —  Empty 
of  inhabitants  even  to  the  ghost!  Both  human  and  spir- 
itual were  wanting.  The  mind  contemplating  him  became 
reflectively  stagnant. 

I  must  not  be  unjust!  Lady  Dunstane  hastened  to  ex- 
claim, at  a  whisper  that  he  had  at  least  proved  his  appre- 
ciation of  Tony;  whom  he  preferred  to  call  Diana,  as  she 
gladly  remembered :  and  the  two  were  bound  together  for  a 
moment  warmly  by  her  recollection  of  her  beloved  Tony's 
touching  little  petition :  "You  will  invite  us  again?"  and 
then  there  had  flashed  in  Tony's  dear  dark  eyes  the  look 
of  their  old  love  drowning.  They  were  not  to  be  thought 
of  separately.  She  admitted  that  the  introduction  to  a 
woman  of  her  friend's  husband  is  crucially  trying  to  him : 
he  may  well  show  worse  than  he  is.  Yet  his  appreciation 
of  Tony  in  espousing  her,  was  rather  marred  by  Sir  Lukin's 
report  of  him  as  a  desperate  admirer  of  beautiful  woman. 
It  might  be  for  her  beauty  only,  not  for  her  spiritual  quali- 
ties! At  present  he  did  not  seem  aware  of  their  existence. 
But,  to  be  entirely  just,  she  had  hardly  exhibited  them  or  a 
sign  of  them  during  the  first  interview :  and  sitting  with 
his  hostess  alone,  he  had  seized  the  occasion  to  say,  that 
he  was  the  happiest  of  men.  He  said  it  with  the  nearest 
approach  to  fervour  she  had  noticed.     Perhaps  the  very 


62  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

fact  of  his  not  producing  a  highly  favourable  impression, 
should  be  set  to  plead  on  his  behalf.  Such  as  he  was,  he 
was  himself,  no  simulator.  She  longed  for  Mr.  Redworth's 
report  of  him. 

Her  compassion  for  Redworth's  feelings  when  behold- 
ing the  woman  he  loved  another  man^s  wife,  did  not  soften 
the  urgency  of  her  injunction  that  he  should  go  speedily, 
and  see  as  much  of  them  as  he  could.  "Because,"  she 
gave  her  reason,  "I  wish  Diana  to  know  she  has  not  lost  a 
single  friend  through  her  marriage,  and  is  only  one  the 
richer." 

Redworth  buckled  himself  to  the  task.  He  belonged  to 
the  class  of  his  countrymen  who  have  a  dungeon-vault  for 
feelings  that  should  not  be  suffered  to  cry  abroad,  and  into 
this  oubliette  he  cast  them,  letting  them  feed  as  they 
might,  or  perish.  It  was  his  heart  down  below,  and  in  no 
voluntary  musings  did  he  listen  to  it,  to  sustain  the  thing. 
Grimly  lord  of  himself,  he  stood  emotionless  before  the 
world.  Some  worthy  fellows  resemble  him,  and  they  are 
called  deep-hearted.  He  was  dungeon-deep.  The  prisoner 
underneath  might  clamour  and  leap;  none  heard  him  or 
knew  of  him;  nor  did  he  ever  view  the  day.  Diana's 
frank :  "  Ah,  Mr.  Redworth,  how  glad  I  am  to  see  you ! " 
was  met  by  the  calmest  formalism  of  the  wish  for  her 
happiness.  He  became  a  guest  at  her  London  house,  and 
his  report  of  the  domesticity  there,  and  notably  of  the 
lord  of  the  house,  pleased  Lady  Dunstane  more  than  her 
husband's.  He  saw  the  kind  of  man  accurately,  as  far  as 
men  are  to  be  seen  on  the  surface;  and  she  could  say 
assentingly,  without  anxiety:  "Yes,  yes,"  to  his  remarks 
upon  Mr.  Warwick,  indicative  of  a  man  of  capable  head  in 
worldly  affairs,  commonplace  beside  his  wife.  The  noble 
gentleman  for  Diana  was  yet  unborn,  they  tacitly  agreed. 
Meantime  one  must  not  put  a  mortal  husband  to  the  fiery 
ordeal  of  his  wife's  deserts,  they  agreed  likewise.  "You 
may  be  sure  she  is  a  constant  friend,"  Lady  Dunstane  said 
for  his  comfort;  and  she  reminded  herself  subsequently  of 
a  shade  of  disappointment  at  his  imperturbable  rejoinder: 
"I  could  calculate  on  it."  For  though  not  at  all  desiring 
to  witness  the  sentimental  lit,  she  wished  to  see  that  he 
held  an  image  of  Diana :  —  surely  a  woman  to  kindle  poets 


THE  COUPLE  63 

and  heroes,  the  princes  of  the  race ;  and  it  was  a  curious 
perversity  that  the  two  men  she  had  moved  were  merely 
excellent,  emotionless,  ordinary  men,  with  heads  for  busi- 
ness. Elsewhere,  out  of  England,  Diana  would  have  been 
a  woman  for  a  place  in  song,  exalted  to  the  skies.  Here 
she  had  the  destiny  to  inflame  Mr.  Redworth  and  Mr. 
Warwick,  two  railway  Directors,  bent  upon  scoring  the 
country  to  the  likeness  of  a  child's  lines  of  hop-scotch  in 
a  gravel-yard. 

As  with  all  invalids,  the  pleasure  of  living  backward 
was  haunted  by  the  tortures  it  evoked,  and  two  years  later 
she  recalled  this  outcry  against  the  Fates.  She  would 
then  have  prayed  for  Diana  to  inflame  none  but  such  men 
as  those  two.  The  original  error  was,  of  course,  that  rash 
and  most  inexplicable  marriage,  a  step  never  alluded  to  by 
the  driven  victim  of  it.  Lady  Dunstane  heard  rumours  of 
dissensions.  Diana  did  not  mention  them.  She  spoke 
of  her  husband  as  unlucky  in  railway  ventures,  and  of  a 
household  necessity  for  money,  nothing  further.  One  day 
she  wrote  of  a  Government  appointment  her  husband  had 
received,  ending  the  letter:  "So  there  is  the  end  of  our 
troubles."  Her  friend  rejoiced,  and  afterward  looking 
back  at  her  satisfaction,  saw  the  dire  beginning  of  them. 

Lord  Dannisburgh's  name,  as  one  of  the  admirers  of 
Mrs.  Warwick,  was  dropped  once  or  twice  by  Sir  Lukin. 
He  had  dined  with  the  Warwicks,  and  met  the  eminent 
member  of  the  Cabinet  at  their  table.  There  is  no  harm 
in  admiration,  especially  on  the  part  of  one  of  a  crowd 
observing  a  star.  No  harm  can  be  imputed  when  the 
husband  of  a  beautiful  woman  accepts  an  appointment  from 
the  potent  Minister  admiring  her.  So  Lady  Dunstane 
thought,  for  she  was  sure  of  Diana  to  her  inmost  soul. 
But  she  soon  perceived  in  Sir  Lukin  that  the  old  Dog- 
world  was  preparing  to  yelp  on  a  scent.  He  of  his  nature 
belonged  to  the  hunting  pack,  and  with  a  cordial  feeling 
for  the  quarry,  he  was  quite  with  his  world  in  expecting 
to  see  her  run,  and  readiness  to  join  the  chase.  No  great 
scandal  had  occurred  for  several  months.  The  world  was 
in  want  of  it;  and  he,  too,  with  a  very  cordial  feeling  for 
the  quarry,  piously  hoping  she  would  escape,  already  had 
his  nose  to  ground,  collecting  testimony  in  the  track  of 


64  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

her.  He  said  little  to  his  wife,  but  his  world  was  getting 
so  noisy  that  he  could  not  help  half  pursing  his  lips,  as 
with  the  soft  whistle  of  an  innuendo  at  the  heels  of  it. 
Redworth  was  in  America,  engaged  in  carving  up  that 
hemisphere.  She  had  no  source  of  information  but  her 
husband's  chance  gossip;  and  London  was  death  to  her; 
and  Diana,  writing  faithfully  twice  a  week,  kept  silence 
as  to  Lord  Dannisburgh,  except  in  naming  him  among  her 
guests.  She  wrote  this,  which  might  have  a  secret  per- 
sonal signification:  "We  women  are  the  verbs  passive  of 
the  alliance,  we  have  to  learn,  and  if  we  take  to  activity, 
with  the  best  intentions,  we  conjugate  a  frightful  disturb- 
ance. We  are  to  run  on  lines,  like  the  steam-trains,  or  we 
come  to  no  station,  dash  to  fragments.  I  have  the  mis- 
fortune to  know  I  was  born  an  active.     I  take  my  chance." 

Once  she  coupled  the  names  of  Lord  Larrian  and  Lord 
Dannisburgh,  remarking  that  she  had  a  fatal  attraction  for 
antiques. 

The  death  of  her  husband's  uncle  and  illness  of  his  aunt 
withdrew  her  to  The  Crossways,  where  she  remained  nurs- 
ing for  several  months,  reading  diligently,  as  her  letters 
showed,  and  watching  the  approaches  of  the  destroyer. 
She  wrote  like  her  former  self,  subdued  by  meditation  in 
the  presence  of  that  inevitable.  The  world  ceased  bark- 
ing. Lady  Dunstane  could  suppose  Mr.  Warwick  to  have 
now  a  reconciling  experience  of  his  wife's  noble  qualities. 
He  probably  did  value  them  more.  He  spoke  of  her  to 
Sir  Lukin  in  London  with  commendation.  "She  is  an 
attentive  nurse."  He  inherited  a  considerable  increase  of 
income  when  he  and  his  wife  were  the  sole  tenants  of  The 
Crossways,  but  disliking  the  house,  for  reasons  hard  to 
explain  by  a  man  previously  professing  to  share  her  attach- 
ment to  it,  he  wished  to  sell  or  let  the  place,  and  his  wife 
would  do  neither.  She  proposed  to  continue  living  in 
their  small  London  house  rather  than  be  cut  off  from  The 
Crossways,  which,  he  said,  was  ludicrous:  people  should 
live  up  to  their  position;  and  he  sneered  at  the  place,  and 
slightly  wounded  her,  for  she  was  open  to  a  wound  when 
the  cold  fire  of  a  renewed  attempt  at  warmth  between  them 
was  crackling  and  showing  bits  of  flame,  after  she  had 
given  proof  of  her  power  to  serve.     Service  to  himself  and 


THE  COUPLE  65 

his  relatives  affected  him.     He  deferred  to  her  craze  for 
The  Crossways,  and  they  lived  in  a  larger  London  house, 
"up  to  their  position,"  which  means  ever  a  trifle  beyond 
it,  and  gave  choice  dinner-parties  to  the  most  eminent. 
His  jealousy  slumbered.     Having  ideas  of  a  seat  in  Parlia- 
ment at  this  period,  and  preferment  superior  to  the  post 
he  held,  Mr.  Warwick  deemed  it  sagacious  to  court  the 
potent  patron  Lord  Dannisburgh  could  be;  and  his  wife 
had  his  interests  at  heart,  the  fork-tongued  world  said. 
The  cry  revived.     Stories  of  Lord  D.  and  Mrs.  W.  whipped 
the  hot  pursuit.     The  moral  repute  of  the  great  Whig  lord 
and  the  beauty  of  the  lady  composed  inflammable  material. 
"Are  you  altogether  cautious?"  Lady  Dunstane  wrote  to 
Diana;  and  her  friend  sent  a  copious  reply:  "You  have 
the  fullest  right  to  ask  your  Tony  anything,  and  I  will 
answer   as  at  the  Judgement  bar.     You   allude   to   Lord 
Dannisburgh.     He  is  near  what  Dada's  age  would  have 
been,  and  is,  I  think  I  can  affirm,  next  to  my  dead  father 
and  my  Emmy,  my  dearest  friend.     I  love  him.     I  could 
say  it  in  the  streets  without  shame ;  and  you  do  not  imagine 
me   shameless.     Whatever  his   character  in  his  younger 
days,  he  can  be  honestly  a  woman's  friend,  believe  me. 
I  see  straight  to  his  heart ;  he  has  no  disguise ;  and  unless 
I  am  to  suppose  that  marriage  is  the  end  of  me,  I  must 
keep  him  among  my  treasures.     I  see  him  almost  daily;  it 
is  not  possible  to  think  I  can  be  deceived;  and  as  long  as 
he  does  me  the  honour  to  esteem  my  poor  portion  of  brains 
by  coming  to  me  for  what  he  is  good  enough  to  call  my 
counsel,  I  shall  let  the  world  wag  its  tongue.     Between 
ourselves,  I  trust  to  be  doing  some  good.     I  know  I  am  of 
use  in  various   ways.     No  doubt  there  is  a  danger  of  a 
woman's   head   being    turned,    when   she   reflects   that  a 
powerful  Minister  governing  a  kingdom  has  not  considered 
her  too  insignificant  to  advise  him;  and  I  am  sensible  of 
it.     I  am,  I  assure  you,  dearest,  on  my  guard  against  it. 
That  would  not  attach  me  to  him,  as  his  homely  friendli- 
ness does.     He  is  the  most  amiable,  cheerful,  benignant  of 
men;  he  has  no  feeling  of  an  enemy,  though  naturally  his 
enemies  are  numerous  and  venomous.  He  is  full  of  obser- 
vation and  humour.     How  he  would  amuse  you !     In  many 
respects  accord  with  you.     And  I  should  not  have  a  spark 

6 


66  DIANA  OF  THE  CBOSSWAYS 

of  jealousy.  Some  day  I  shall  beg  permission  to  brixig 
Mm  to  Copsley.  At  present,  during  the  Session,  he  is 
too  busy,  as  you  know.  Me  —  his  'crystal  spring  of  wis- 
dom '  —  he  can  favour  with  no  more  than  an  hour  in  the 
afternoon,  or  a  few  minutes  at  night.  Or  I  get  a  pen- 
cilled note  from  the  benches  of  the  House,  with  an  anec- 
dote, or  news  of  a  Division.     I  am  sure  to  be  enlivened. 

"  So  I  have  written  to  you  fully,  simply,  frankly.  Have 
perfect  faith  in  your  Tony,  who  would,  she  vows  to  heaven, 
die  rather  than  disturb  it  and  her  heart's  beloved." 

The  letter  terminated  with  one  of  Lord  Dannisburgh's 
anecdotes,  exciting  to  merriment  in  the  season  of  its 
freshness ;  —  and  a  postscript  of  information :  "  Augustus 
expects  a  mission  —  about  a  month;  uncertain  whether  I 
accompany  him." 

Mr.  Warwick  departed  on  his  mission.  Diana  remained 
in  London.  Lady  Dunstane  wrote  entreating  her  to  pass 
the  month  —  her  favourite  time  of  the  violet  yielding  to 
the  cowslip  —  at  Copsley.  The  invitation  could  not  be 
accepted,  but  the  next  day  Diana  sent  word  that  she 
had  a  surprise  for  the  following  Sunday,  and  would  bring 
a  friend  to  lunch,  if  Sir  Lukin  would  meet  them  at  the 
corner  of  the  road  in  the  valley  leading  up  to  the  heights, 
at  a  stated  hour. 

Lady  Dunstane  gave  the  listless  baronet  his  directions, 
observing:  "It's  odd,  she  never  will  come  alone  since  her 
marriage." 

"  Queer,"  said  he  of  the  serenest  absence  of  conscience  ; 
and  that  there  must  be  something  not  entirely  right  going 
on,  he  strongly  inclined  to  think. 


CHAPTER  YII 

THE    CRISIS 


It  was  a  confirmed  suspicion  when  he  beheld  Lord 
Dannisburgh  on  the  box  of  a  four-in-hand,  and  the  peer- 
less Diana  beside  him,  cockaded  lackeys  in  plain  livery 
und  the  lady's  maid  to  the  rear.     But  Lord  Dannisburgh's 


THE   CRISIS  67 

visit  was  a  compliment,  and  the  freak  of  his  driving  down 
under  the  beams  of  Aurora  on  a  sober  Sunday  morning 
capital  fun ;  so  with  a  gaiety  that  was  kept  alive  for  the 
invalid  Emma  to  partake  of  it,  they  rattled  away  to  the 
heights,  and  climbed  them,  and  Diana  rushed  to  the  arms 
of  her  friend,  whispering  and  cooing  for  pardon  if  she 
startled  her,  guilty  of  a  little  whiff  of  blarney  :  —  Lord 
Dannisburgh  wanted  so  much  to  be  introduced  to  her,  and 
she  so  much  wanted  her  to  know  him,  and  she  hoped  to 
be  graciously  excused  for  thus  bringing  them  together, 
"  that  she  might  be  chorus  to  them  ! "  Chorus  was  a  pretty 
fiction  on  the  part  of  the  thrilling  and  topping  voice.  She 
was  the  very  radiant  Diana  of  her  earliest  opening  day, 
both  in  look  and  speech,  a  queenly  comrade,  and  a  spirit 
leaping  and  shining  like  a  mountain  water.  She  did  not 
seduce,  she  ravished.  The  judgement  was  taken  captive 
and  flowed  with  her.  As  to  the  prank  of  the  visit,  Emma 
heartily  enjoyed  it  and  hugged  it  for  a  holiday  of  her  own, 
and  doting  on  the  beautiful,  dark-eyed,  fresh  creature,  who 
bore  the  name  of  the  divine  Huntress,  she  thought  her  a 
true  Dian  in  stature,  step,  and  attributes,  the  genius  of 
laughter  superadded.  None  else  on  earth  so  sweetly 
laughed,  none  so  spontaneously,  victoriously  provoked  the 
healthful  openness.  Her  delicious  chatter,  and  her  muse- 
ful  sparkle  in  listening,  equally  quickened  every  sense  of 
life.  Adorable  as  she  was  to  her  friend  Emma  at  all  times, 
she  that  day  struck  a  new  fountain  in  memory.  And  it 
was  pleasant  to  see  the  great  lord's  admiration  of  this 
wonder.  One  could  firmly  believe  in  their  friendship,  and 
his  winning  ideas  from  the  abounding  bubbling  well.  A 
recurrent  smile  beamed  on  his  face  when  hearing  and 
observing  her.  Certain  dishes  provided  at  the  table  were 
Diana's  favourites,  and  he  relished  them,  asking  for  a 
second  help,  and  remarking  that  her  taste  was  good  in  that 
as  in  all  things.  They  lunched,  eating  like  boys.  They 
walked  over  the  grounds  of  Copsley,  and  into  the  lanes  and 
across  the  meadows  of  the  cowslip,  rattling,  chatting,  en- 
livening the  frosty  air,  happy  as  children  biting  to  the 
juices  of  ripe  apples  off  the  tree.  But  Tony  was  the  tree, 
the  dispenser  of  the  rosy  gifts.  She  had  a  moment  of 
reflection,  only   a   moment,  and  Emm"a  felt  the  pause  as 


68  DIANA   OF  THE   CROSS  WAYS 

though  a  cloud  had  shadowed  them  and  a  spirit  had  been 
shut  away.  Both  spoke  of  their  happiness  at  the  kiss  of 
parting.  That  melancholy  note  at  the  top  of  the  wave  to 
human  hearts  conscious  of  its  enforced  decline  was  repeated 
by  them,  and  Diana's  eyelids  blinked  to  dismiss  a  tear. 

"  You  have  no  troubles  ?  "  Emma  said. 

"  Only  the  pain  of  the  good-bye  to  my  beloved,"  said 
Diana.  **I  have  never  been  happier  —  never  shall  be! 
Now  you  know  him  you  think  with  me  ?  I  knew  you 
would.  You  have  seen  him  as  he  always  is  —  except  when 
he  is  armed  for  battle.  He  is  the  kindest  of  souls.  And 
soul  I  say.  He  is  the  one  man  among  men  who  gives  me 
notions  of  a  soul  in  men." 

The  eulogy  was  exalted.  Lady  Dunstane  made  a  little 
mouth  for  Oh,  in  correction  of  the  transcendental  touch, 
though  she  remembered  their  foregone  conversations  upon 
men  —  strange  beings  that  they  are!  —  and  understood 
Diana's  meaning. 

"  Really  !  really  !  honour  ! "  Diana  emphasized  her  ex- 
travagant praise,  to  print  it  fast.  "Hear  him  speak  of 
Ireland." 

"  Would  he  not  speak  of  Ireland  in  a  tone  to  catch 
the  Irishwoman  ?  " 

'^  He  is  past  thoughts  of  catching,  dearest.  At  that  age 
men  are  pools  of  fish,  or  what  you  will :  they  are  not 
anglers.     Next  year,  if  you  invite  us,  we  will  come  again." 

*'But  you  will  come  to  stay  in  the  Winter  ?" 

"  Certainly.     But  I  am  speaking  of  one  of  my  holidays." 

They  kissed  fervently.  The  lady  mounted  :  the  grey  and 
portly  lord  followed  her;  Sir  Lukin  flourished  his  whip, 
and  Emma  was  left  to  brood  over  her  friend's  last  words : 
"  One  of  my  holidaj^-s."  Not  a  hint  to  the  detriment  of  her 
husband  had  passed.  The  stray  beam  balefully  illumi- 
nating her  marriage  slipped  from  her  involuntarily.  Sir 
Lukin  was  troublesome  with  his  ejaculations  that  evening, 
and  kept  speculating  on  the  time  of  the  arrival  of  the 
four-in-hand  in  London ;  upon  which  he  thought  a  great 
deal  depended.  They  had  driven  out  of  town  early,  and 
if  they  drove  back  late  they  would  not  be  seen,  as  all  the 
cacklers  were  sure  then  to  be  dressing  for  dinner,  and  he 
would  not  pass  the  Clubs.     ''I  couldn't  not  suggest  it,'* 


THE   CRISIS  69 

he  said.  "  But  Dannisburgh  's  an  old  hand.  But  they  say 
he  snaps  his  fingers  at  tattle,  and  laughs.  Well,  it  does  n't 
matter  for  him,  perhaps,  but  a  game  of  two.  .  .  .  Oh! 
it  '11  be  all  right.  They  can't  reach  London  before  dusk. 
And  the  cat 's  away." 

"It's  more  than  ever  incomprehensible  to  me  how  she 
could  have  married  that  man,"  said  his  wife. 

"  I  've  long  since  given  it  up,"  said  he. 

Diana  wrote  her  thanks  for  the  delightful  welcome,  tell- 
ing of  her  drive  home  to  smoke  and  solitude,  with  a  new 
host  of  romantic  sensations  to  keep  her  company.  She 
wrote  thrice  in  the  week,  and  the  same  addition  of  one 
to  the  ordinary  number  next  week.  Then  for  three  weeks 
not  a  line.  Sir  Lukin  brought  news  from  London  that 
Warwick  had  returned,  nothing  to  explain  the  silence.  A 
letter  addressed  to  The  Crossways  was  likewise  unnoticed. 
The  supposition  that  they  must  be  visiting  on  a  round, 
appeared  rational;  but  many  weeks  elapsed,  until  Sir 
Lukin  received  a  printed  sheet  in  the  superscription  of  a 
former  military  comrade,  who  had  marked  a  paragraph. 
It  was  one  of  those  journals,  now  barely  credible,  dedicated 
to  the  putrid  of  the  upper  circle,  wherein  initials  raised 
sewer-lamps,  and  Asmodeus  lifted  a  roof,  leering  hideously. 
Thousands  detested  it,  and  fattened  their  crops  on  it. 
Domesticated  beasts  of  superior  habits  to  the  common  will 
indulge  themselves  with  a  luxurious  roll  in  carrion,  for  a 
revival  of  their  original  instincts.  Society  was  largely  a 
purchaser.  The  ghastly  thing  was  dreaded  as  a  scourge, 
hailed  as  a  refreshment,  nourished  as  a  parasite.  It  pro- 
fessed undaunted  honesty,  and  operated  in  the  fashion 
of  the  worms  bred  of  decay.  Success  was  its  boasted  justi- 
fication. The  animal  world,  when  not  rigorously  watched, 
will  always  crown  with  success  the  machine  supplying  its 
appetites.  The  old  dog-world  took  signal  from  it.  The 
one-legged  devil-god  waved  his  wooden  hoof,  and  the 
creatures  in  view,  the  hunt  was  uproarious.  Why  should 
we  seem  better  than  we  are  ?  —  down  with  hypocrisy, 
cried  the  censor  morum,  spicing  the  lamentable  derelictions 
of  this  and  that  great  person,  male  and  female.  The  plea 
of  corruption  of  blood  in  the  world,  to  excuse  the  public 
chafing  of  a  grievous  itch,  is  not  less  old  than  sin ;  and 


70  DIAiTA   OF   THE   CROSSWAYS 

it  offers  a  merry  day  of  frisky  truant  running  to  the 
animal  made  unashamed  by  another  and  another  stripped, 
branded,  and  stretched  flat.  Sir  Lukin  read  of  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  W.  and  a  distinguished  Peer  of  the  realm.  The 
paragraph  was  brief;  it  had  a  flavour.  Promise  of  more 
to  come,  pricked  curiosity.  He  read  it  enraged,  feeling 
for  his  wife  ;  and  again  indignant,  feeling  for  Diana.  His 
third  reading  found  him  out :  he  felt  for  both,  but  as  a 
member  of  the  whispering  world,  much  behind  the  scenes, 
he  had  a  longing  for  the  promised  insinuations,  just  to 
know  what  they  could  say,  or  dared  say.  The  paper  was 
not  shown  to  Lady  Dunstane.  A  run  to  London  put  him 
in  the  tide  of  the  broken  dam  of  gossip.  The  names  were 
openly  spoken  and  swept  from  mouth  to  mouth  of  the 
scandalmongers,  gathering  matter  as  they  flew.  He 
knocked  at  Diana's  door,  where  he  was  informed  that  the 
mistress  of  the  house  was  absent.  More  than  official 
gravity  accompanied  the  announcement.  Her  address  was 
unknown.  Sir  Lukin  thought  it  now  time  to  tell  his 
wife.  He  began  with  a  hesitating  circumlocution,  in  order 
to  prepare  her  mind  for  bad  news.  She  divined  imme- 
diately that  it  concerned  Diana,  and  forcing  him  to  speak 
to  the  point,  she  had  the  story  jerked  out  to  her  in  a 
sentence.     It  stopped  her  heart. 

The  chill  of  death  was  tasted  in  that  wavering  ascent  from 
oblivion  to  recollection.  Why  had  not  Diana  come  to  her, 
she  asked  herself,  and  asked  her  husband ;  who,  as  usual, 
was  absolutely  unable  to  say.  Under  compulsory  squeezing, 
he  would  have  answered,  that  she  did  not  come  because  she 
could  not  fib  so  easily  to  her  bosom  friend  :  and  this  he 
thought,  notwithstanding  his  personal  experience  of  Diana's 
generosity.  But  he  had  other  personal  experiences  of  her 
sex,  and  her  sex  plucked  at  the  bright  star  and  drowned  it. 

The  happy  day  of  Lord  Dannisburgh's  visit  settled  in 
Emma's  belief  as  the  cause  of  Mr.  Warwick's  unpardonable 
suspicions  and  cruelty.  Arguing  from  her  own  sensations 
of  a  day  that  had  been  like  the  return  of  sweet  health  to  her 
frame,  she  could  see  nothing  but  the  loveliest  freakish  in- 
nocence in  Diana's  conduct,  and  she  recalled  her  looks,  her 
words,  every  fleeting  gesture,  even  to  the  ingenuousness  of 
the  noble  statesman's  admiration  of  her,  for  the  confusion 


THE  CRISIS  71 

of  her  unmanly  and  iinwortliy  husband.  And  Emma  was 
nevertheless  a  thoughtful  person  ;  only  her  heart  was  at  the 
head  of  her  thoughts,  and  led  the  file,  whose  reasoning  was 
accurate  on  erratic  tracks.  All  night  her  heart  went  at 
fever  pace.  She  brought  the  repentant  husband  to  his  knees, 
and  then  doubted,  strongl}^  doubted,  whether  she  would, 
whether  in  consideration  for  her  friend  she  could,  intercede 
with  Diana  to  forgive  him.  In  the  morning  she  slept 
heavily.  Sir  Lukin  had  gone  to  London  early  for  further 
tidings.  She  awoke  about  midday,  and  found  a  letter  on 
her  pillow.  It  was  Diana's.  Then  while  her  fingers  eagerly 
tore  it  open,  her  heart,  the  champion  rider  over-night,  sank. 
It  needed  support  of  facts,  and  feared  them :  not  in  distrust 
of  that  dear  persecuted  soul,  but  because  the  very  bravest  of 
hearts  is  of  its  nature  a  shivering  defender,  sensitive  in  the 
presence  of  any  hostile  array,  much  craving  for  material 
support,  until  the  mind  and  spirit  displace  it,  depute  it  to 
second  them  instead  of  leading. 

She  read  by  a  dull  November  fog-light  a  mixture  of  the 
dreadful  and  the  comforting,  and  dwelt  upon  the  latter  in 
abandonment,  hugged  it,  though  conscious  of  evil  and  the 
little  that  there  was  to  veritably  console. 

The  close  of  the  letter  struck  the  blow.  After  bluntly 
stating  that  Mr.  Warwick  had  served  her  with  a  process,  and 
that  he  had  no  case  without  suborning  witnesses,  Diana  said ; 
"  But  I  leave  the  case,  and  him,  to  the  world.  Ireland,  or 
else  America,  it  is  a  guiltless  kind  of  suicide  .to  bury  myself 
abroad.  He  has  my  letters.  They  are  such  as  I  can  own  to 
you,  and  ask  you  to  kiss  me  —  and  kiss  me  when  you  have 
heard  all  the  evidence,  all  that  I  can  add  to  it,  kiss  me. 
You  know  me  too  well  to  think  I  would  ask  you  to  kiss 
criminal  lips.  But  I  cannot  face  the  world.  In  the  dock, 
yes.  Not  where  I  am  expected  to  smile  and  sparkle,  on 
pain  of  incurring  suspicion  if  I  show  a  sign  of  oppression. 
I  cannot  do  that.  I  see  myself  wearing  a  false  grin  — your 
Tony!  No,  I  do  well  to  go.  This  is  my  resolution;  and  in 
consequence,  my  beloved !  my  only  truly  loved  on  earth !  I 
do  not  come  to  you,  to  grieve  you,  as  I  surely  should.  Nor 
would  it  soothe  me,  dearest.  This  will  be  to  you  the  best  of 
reasons.  It  could  not  soothe  me  to  see  myself  giving  pain 
to  Emma.    I  am  like  a  pestilence,  and  let  me  swing  away  to 


72  DIANA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

the  desert,  for  there  I  do  no  harm.  I  know  I  am  right.  I 
have  questioned  myself  —  it  is  not  cowardice.  I  do  not 
quail.  I  abhor  the  part  of  actress.  I  should  do  it  well  — 
too  well ;  destroy  my  soul  in  the  performance.  Is  a  good 
name  before  such  a  world  as  this  worth  that  sacrifice  ?  A 
convent  and  self-quenching  ;  —  cloisters  would  seem  to  me 
like  holy  dew.  But  that  would  be  sleep,  and  I  feel  the 
powers  of  life.  Never  have  I  felt  them  so  mightily.  If  it 
were  not  for  being  called  on  to  act  and  mew,  I  would  stay, 
fight,  meet  a  bayonet-hedge  of  charges  and  rebut  them. 
I  have  my  natural  weapons  and  my  cause.  It  must  be  con- 
fessed that  I  have  also  more  knowledge  of  men  and  the 
secret  contempt  —  it  must  be  —  the  best  of  them  entertain 
for  us.  Oh !  and  we  confirm  it  if  we  trust  them.  But  they 
have  been  at  a  wicked  school. 

"I  will  write.  From  whatever  place,  you  shall  have 
letters,  and  constant.  I  write  no  more  now.  In  my  present 
mood  I  find  no  alternative  between  rageing  and  drivelling. 
I  am  henceforth  dead  to  the  world.  Never  dead  to  Emma 
till  my  breath  is  gone  —  poor  flame !  I  blow  at  a  bed-room 
candle,  by  which  I  write  in  a  brown  fog,  and  behold  what  I 
am  —  though  not  even  serving  to  write  such  a  tangled 
scrawl  as  this.  I  am  of  no  mortal  service.  In  two  days  I 
shall  be  out  of  England.  Within  a  week  you  shall  hear 
where.  I  long  for  your  heart  on  mine,  your  dear  eyes. 
You  have  faith  in  me,  and  I  fly  from  you  !  —  I  must  be  mad. 
Yet  I  feel  calmly  reasonable.  I  know  that  this  is  the  thing 
to  do.  Some  years  hence  a  grey  woman  may  return,  to  hear 
of  a  butterfly  Diana,  that  had  her  day  and  disappeared. 
Better  than  a  mewing  and  courtseying  simulacrum  of  the 
woman  —  I  drivel  again.  Adieu.  I  suppose  I  am  not  liable 
to  capture  and  imprisonment  until  the  day  when  my  name 
is  cited  to  appear.  I  have  left  London.  This  letter  and  I 
quit  the  scene  by  different  routes  —  I  would  they  were  one. 
My  beloved !  I  have  an  ache  —  I  think  I  am  wronging  you. 
I  am  not  mistress  of  myself,  and  do  as  something  within 
me,  wiser  than  I,  dictates.  —  You  will  write  kindly.  Write 
your  whole  heart.  It  is  not  compassion  I  want,  I  want  you. 
I  can  bear  stripes  from  you.  Let  me  hear  Emma's  voice 
--the  true   voice.      This   running  away  merits   your  re- 


THE  CRISIS  73 

proaches.  It  will  lOok  like  —  I  have  more  to  confess  : 
the  tigress  in  me  wishes  it  were!  I  should  then  have  a 
reckless  passion  to  fold  me  about,  and  the  glory  —  infernal, 
if  you  name  it  so,  and  so  it  would  be  —  of  suffering  for  and 
with  some  one  else.  As  it  is,  I  am  utterly  solitary,  sus- 
tained neither  from  above  nor  below,  except  within  myself, 
and  that  is  all  fire  and  smoke,  like  their  new  engines.  —  I 
kiss  this  miserable  sheet  of  paper. — Yes,  I  judge  that  I 
have  run  off  a  line  —  and  what  a  line  !  —  which  hardly 
shows  a  trace  for  breathing  things  to  follow  until  they  feel 
the  transgression  in  wreck.  How  immensely  nature  seems 
to  prefer  men  to  women !  — But  this  paper  is  happier  than 
the  writer. 

"  Your  Tony." 

That  was  the  end.  Emma  kissed  it  in  tears.  They  had 
often  talked  of  the  possibility  of  a  classic  friendship 
between  women,  the  alliance  of  a  mutual  devotedness 
men  choose  to  doubt  of.  She  caught  herself  accusing 
Tony  of  the  lapse  from  friendship.  Hither  should  the 
true  friend  have  flown  unerringly. 

The  blunt  ending  of  the  letter  likewise  dealt  a  wound. 
She  reperused  it,  perused  and  meditated.  The  flight  of 
Mrs.  Warwick  !  She  heard  that  cry  —  fatal !  But  she  had 
no  means  of  putting  a  hand  on  her.  — "  Your  Tony."  The 
coldness  might  be  set  down  to  exhaustion  :  it  might,  yet  her 
not  coming  to  her  friend  for  counsel  and  love  was  a  positive 
weight  in  the  indifferent  scale.  She  read  the  letter  back- 
wards, and  by  snatches  here  and  there ;  many  perusals  and 
hours  passed  before  the  scattered  creature  exhibited  in  its 
pages  came  to  her  out  of  the  flying  threads  of  the  web  as 
her  living  Tony,  whom  she  loved  and  prized,  and  was 
ready  to  defend  against  the  world.  By  that  time  the  fog 
had  lifted  ;  she  saw  the  sky  on  the  borders  of  milky  cloud- 
folds.  Her  invalid's  chill  sensitiveness  conceived  a  sym- 
pathy in  the  baring  heavens,  and  lying  on  her  sofa  in  the 
drawing-room  she  gained  strength  of  meditative  vision, 
weak  though  she  was  to  help,  through  ceasing  to  brood  on 
her  wound  and  herself.  She  cast  herself  into  her  dear 
Tony's  feelings ;  and  thus  it  came,  that  she  imagined  Tony 
would  visit  The  Crossways,  where   she  kept  souvenirs  of 


74  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

her  father,  his  cane,  and  his  writing-desk,  and  a  precious 
miniature  of  him  hanging  above  it,  before  leaving  England 
for  ever.  The  fancy  sprang  to  certainty  ;  every  speculation 
confirmed  it.  Had  Sir  Lukin  been  at  home  she  would  have 
despatched  him  to  The  Crossways  at  once.  The  West  wind 
blew,  and  gave  her  a  view  of  the  Downs  beyond  the  weald 
from  her  southern  window.  She  thought  it  even  possible 
to  drive  there  and  reach  the  place,  on  the  chance  of  her 
vivid  suggestion,  some  time  after  nightfall ;  but  a  walk 
across  the  room  to  try  her  forces  was  too  convincing  of  her 
inability.  She  walked  with  an  ebony  silver-mounted  stick, 
a  present  from  Mr.  Redworth.  She  was  leaning  on  it  when 
the  card  of  Thomas  Kedworth  was  handed  to  her. 


CHAPTER   VIII 

IN    WHICH    IS     EXHIBITED     HOW    A    PRACTICAL     MAN     AND    A 
DIVINING    WOMAN    LEARN    TO    RESPECT    ONE    ANOTHER 

"You  see,  you  are  my  crutch,'^  Lady  Dunstane  said  to 
him,  raising  the  stick  in  reminder  of  the  present. 

He  offered  his  arm  and  hurriedly  informed  her,  to  dispose 
of  dull  personal  matter,  that  he  had  just  landed.  She 
looked  at  the  clock.  "Lukin  is  in  town.  You  know  the 
song :  '  Alas,  I  scarce  can  go  or  creep  While  Lukin  is  away.' 
I  do  not  doubt  you  have  succeeded  in  your  business  over 
there.  Ah !  Now  I  suppose  you  have  confidence  in  your 
success.  I  should  have  predicted  it,  had  you  come  to  me." 
She  stood,  either  musing  or  in  weakness,  and  said  abruptly : 
"  Will  you  object  to  lunching  at  One  o'clock  ?  '^ 

"  The  sooner  the  better,"  said  Redworth.  She  had  sighed  : 
her  voice  betrayed  some  agitation,  strange  in  so  serenely- 
minded  a  person. 

His  partial  acquaintance  with  the  Herculean  Sir  Lukin's 
reputation  in  town  inspired  a  fear  of  his  being  about  to 
receive  admission  to  the  distressful  confidences  of  the  wife, 
and  he  asked  if  Mrs.  Warwick  was  well.  The  answer 
sounded  ominous,  with  its  accompaniment  of  evident  pain : 
"I  think  her  health  is  good." 


A  PRACTICAL  MAN  AND   A  DIVINING  WOMAN      75 

Had  they  quarrelled  ?  He  said  he  had  not  heard  a  word 
of  Mrs.  Warwick  for  several  months. 

"  I  heard  from  her  this  morning,"  said  Lady  Dunstane, 
and  motioned  him  to  a  chair  beside  the  sofa,  where  she 
half  reclined,  closing  her  eyes.  The  sight  of  tears  on  the 
eyelashes  frightened  him.  She  roused  herself  to  look  at 
the  clock.  "  Providence  or  accident,  you  are  here,"  she 
said.  ''  I  could  not  have  prayed  for  the  coming  of  a  truer 
man.  Mrs.  Warwick  is  in  great  danger.  .  .  .  You  know 
our  love.  She  is  the  best  of  me,  heart  and  soul.  Her 
husband  has  chosen  to  act  on  vile  suspicions  —  baseless,  I 
could  hold  my  hand  in  the  fire  and  swear.  She  has  enemies, 
or  the  jealous  fury  is  on  the  man  —  I  know  little  of  him. 
He  has  commenced  an  action  against  her.  He  will  rue  it. 
But  she  .  .  .  you  understand  this  of  women  at  least ;  — 
they  are  not  cowards  in  all  things  !  —  but  the  horror  of 
facing  a  public  scandal :  —  my  poor  girl  writes  of  the  hate- 
fulness  of  having  to  act  the  complacent  —  put  on  her 
accustomed  self !  She  would  have  to  go  about,  a  mark  for 
the  talkers,  and  behave  as  if  nothing  were  in  the  air' —  full 
of  darts  !  Oh,  that  general  whisper  !  —  it  makes  a  coup  de 
massue  —  a  gale  to  sink  the  bravest  vessel :  —  and  a  woman 
must  preserve  her  smoothest  front :  chat,  smile  —  or  else ! 

—  Well,  she  shrinks  from  it.  I  should  too.  She  is  leaving 
the  country." 

''Wrong  !  "  cried  Redworth. 

"  Wrong  indeed.  She  writes,  that  in  two  days  she  will 
be  out  of  it.  Judge  her  as  I  do,  though  you  are  a  man,  I 
pray.    You  have  seen  the  hunted  hare.     It  is  our  education 

—  we  have  something  of  the  hare  in  us  when  the  hounds 
are  full  cry.  Our  bravest,  our  best,  have  an  impulse  to  run. 
'  By  this,  poor  Wat  far  off  upon  a  hill.'  Shakespeare  would 
have  the  divine  comprehension.  I  have  thought  all  round 
it  and  come  back  to  him.  She  is  one  of  Shakespeare's 
women  :  another  character,  but  one  of  his  own :  —  another 
Herraione  !  I  dream  of  him  —  seeing  her  with  that  eye  of 
steady  flame.  The  bravest  and  best  of  us  at  bay  in  the 
world  need  an  eye  like  his,  to  read  deep  and  not  be  baffled 
by  inconsistencies." 

Insensibly  Redworth  blinked.  His  consciousness  of  an 
exalted  compassion  for  the  lady  was  heated  by  these  flights 


76  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

of  advocacy  to  feel  that  he  was  almost  seated  beside  the 
sovereign  poet  thus  eulogized,  and  he  was  of  a  modest 
nature. 

"But  you  are  practical,"  pursued  Lady  Dunstane,  ob- 
serving signs  that  she  took  for  impatience.  "You  are 
thinking  of  what  can  be  done.  If  Lukin  were  here  I 
would  send  him  to  The  Crossways  without  a  moment's 
delay,  on  the  chance,  the  mere  chance :  —  it  shines  to  me ! 
If  I  were  only  a  little  stronger!  I  fear  I  might  break 
down,  and  it  would  be  unfair  to  my  husband.  He  has 
trouble  enough  with  my  premature  infirmities  already.  I 
am  certain  she  will  go  to  The  Crossways.  Tony  is  one  of 
the  women  who  burn  to  give  last  kisses  to  things  they 
love.  And  she  has  her  little  treasures  hoarded  there. 
She  was  born  there.  Her  father  died  there.  She  is  three 
parts  Irish  —  superstitious  in  affection.  I  know  her  so 
well.  At  this  moment  I  see  her  there.  If  not,  she  has 
grown  unlike  herself." 

"Have  you  a  stout  horse  in  the  stables?"  Eedworth 
asked. 

"You  remember  the  mare  Bertha;  you  have  ridden  her." 
"The  mare  would  do,  and  better  than  a  dozen  horses." 
He  consulted  his  watch.     "  Let  me  mount  Bertha,  I  engage 
to  deliver  a  letter  at  The  Crossways  to-night." 

Lady  Dunstane  half  inclined  to  act  hesitation  in  accept- 
ing the  aid  she  sought,  but  said :  "  Will  you  find  your  way  ?  " 
He  spoke  of  three  hours  of  daylight  and  a  moon  to  rise. 
"  She  has  often  pointed  out  to  me  from  your  ridges  where 
The  Crossways  lies,  about  three  miles  from  the  Downs, 
near  a  village  named  Sterling,  on  the  road  to  Brasted. 
The  house  has  a  small  plantation  of  firs  behind  it,  and  a 
bit  of  river  —  rare  for  Sussex  —  to  the  right.  An  old 
straggling  red  brick  house  at  Crossways,  a  stone's  throw 
from  a  fingerpost  on  a  square  of  green :  roads  to  Brasted, 
London,  Wickford,  Biddlehurst.  I  shall  find  it.  Write 
what  you  have  to  say,  my  lady,  and  confide  it  to  me.  She 
shall  have  it  to-night,  if  she  's  where  you  suppose.  I  '11 
go,  with  your  permission,  and  take  a  look  at  the  mare. 
Sussex  roads  are  heavy  in  this  damp  weather,  and  the  frost 
coming  on  won't  improve  them  for  a  tired  beast.  We 
haven't  our  rails  laid  down  there  yet." 


A   PRACTICAL   MAN   AND    A   DIVINING    WOMAN       77 

"You  make  me  admit  some  virtues  in  the  practical," 
said  Lady  Dunstane;  and  had  the  poor  fellow  vollied  forth 
a  tale  of  the  everlastingness  of  his  passion  for  Diana,  it 
would  have  touched  her  far  less  than  his  exact  memory  of 
Diana^s  description  of  her  loved  birthplace. 

She  wrote: 

"I  trust  my  messenger  to  tell  you  how  T  hang  on  you. 
I  see  my  ship  making  for  the  rocks.  You  break  your 
Emma^s  heart.  It  will  be  the  second  wrong  step.  I  shall 
not  survive  it.  The  threat  has  made  me  incapable  of 
rushing  to  you,  as  T  might  have  had  strength  to  do  yester- 
day. I  am  shattered,  and  I  wait  panting  for  Mr.  Red- 
worth's  return  with  you.  He  has  called,  by  accident,  as 
we  say.  Trust  to  him.  If  ever  heaven  was  active  to 
avert  a  fatal  mischance  it  is  to-day.  You  will  not  stand 
against  my  supplication.  It  is  my  life  I  cry  for.  I  have 
no  more  time.  He  starts.  He  leaves  me  to  pray  —  like 
the  mother  seeing  her  child  on  the  edge  of  the  cliff.  Come. 
This  is  your  breast,  my  Tony!  And  your  soul  warns  you 
it  is  right  to  come.  Do  rightly.  Scorn  other  counsel  — 
the  coward's.  Come  with  our  friend  —  the  one  man  known 
to  me  who  can  be  a  friend  of  women. 

"Your  Emma." 

Redworth  was  in  the  room.  "The  mare  '11  do  it  well," 
he  said.  "  She  has  had  her  feed,  and  in  five  minutes  will 
be  saddled  at  the  door." 

But  you  must  eat,  dear  friend,"  said  the  hostess. 
I  '11   munch  at  a  packet  of  sandwiches   on   the  way. 
There  seems  a  chance,   and  the  time  for  lunching   may 
miss  it." 

"  You  understand  ...   ?  " 

"Everything,  I  fancy." 

"If  she  is  there!" 

"One  break  in  the  run  will  turn  her  back." 

The  sensitive  invalid  felt  a  blow  in  his  following  up 
the  simile  of  the  hunted  hare  for  her  friend,  but  it  had  a 
promise  of  hopefulness.  And  this  was  all  that  could  be 
done  by  earthly  agents,  under  direction  of  spiritual,  as 
her  imagination  encouraged  her  to  believe. 


«T  '1 


78  DIAITA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

She  saw  him  start,  after  fortifying  him  with  a  tumbler 
of  choice  Bordeaux,  thinking  how  Tony  would  have  said 
she  was  like  a  lady  arming  her  knight  for  battle.      On  the 
back  of  the  mare  he  passed  her  window,  after  lifting  his 
hat,   and  he  thumped  at  his  breast-pocket,    to  show  her 
where  the  letter  housed  safely.     The  packet  of  provision 
bulged  on  his  hip,  absurdly  and  blessedly  to  her  sight,  not 
unlike  the  man,  in  his  combination  of  robust  serviceable 
qualities,  as  she  reflected  during  the  later  hours,  until  the 
sun  fell  on  smouldering  November  woods,  and  sensations 
of  the  frost  he  foretold  bade  her   remember  that  he  had 
gone  forth  riding  like  a  huntsman.      His   great-coat  lay 
on  a  chair  in  the  hall,  and  his   travelling-bag  was  beside 
it.     He  had  carried  it  up  from   the  valley,  expecting  hos- 
pitality, and  she  had  sent  him  forth  half  naked  to  weather 
a  frosty  November  night!      She  called  in  the  groom,  whose 
derision  of  a  great-coat  for    any  gentleman  upon  Bertha, 
meaning  work  for  the  mare,  appeased  her  remorsefulness. 
Brisby,  the  groom,  reckoned  how  long  the  mare  would  take 
to  do  the  distance  to   Sterling,  with  a  rider  like  Mr.  Red- 
worth  on   her   back.     By   seven,    Brisby   calculated,  Mr. 
Redworth  would  be    knocking   at  the  door  of  the  Three 
Ravens  Inn,  at  Storling,    when   the   mare  would  have  a 
decent  grooming,  and  Mr.   Redworth  was  not  the  gentle- 
man to  let  her  be  fed  out  of  his  eye.     More  than  that, 
Brisby  had  some  acquaintance  with  the  people  of  the  inn. 
He  begged  to  inform  her  ladyship    that   he  was   half  a 
Sussex  man,  though  not  exactly  born   in  the  county;  his 
parents  had  removed  to  Sussex  after  the  great  event;  and 
the  Downs  were  his  first  field  of   horse-exercise,  and  no 
place  in  the  world  was  like  them,  fair  weather  or  foul. 
Summer  or  Winter,  and  snow  ten  feet  deep  in  the  gullies. 
The  grandest  air  in  England,  he  had  heard  say. 

His  mistress  kept  him  to  the  discourse,  for  the  comfort 
of  hearing  hard  bald  matter-of-fact;  and  she  was  amused 
and  rebuked  by  his  assumption  that  she  must  be  entertain- 
ing an  anxiety  about  master's  favourite  mare.  But,  ah! 
that  Diana  had  delayed  in  choosing  a  mate;  had  avoided 
her  disastrous  union  with  perhaps  a  more  imposing  man, 
to  see  the  true  beauty  of  masculine  character  in  Mr.  Red- 
worth,  as  he  showed  himself  to-day.     How  could  he  have 


A  PRACTICAL  MAN  AND   A  DIVINING   WOiVIAN      79 

doubted  succeeding?  One  grain  more  of  faith  in  his 
energy,  and  Diana  might  have  been  mated  to  the  right 
husband  for  her  —  an  open-minded  clear-faced  English 
gentleman.  Her  speculative  ethereal  mind  clung  to  bald 
matter-of-fact  to-day.  She  would  have  vowed  that  it  was 
the  sole  potentially  heroical.  Even  Brisby  partook  of  the 
reflected  rays,  and  he  was  very  benevolently  considered  by 
her.  She  dismissed  him  only  when  his  recounting  of  the 
stages  of  Bertha's  journey  began  to  fatigue  her  and  deaden 
the  medical  efficacy  of  him  and  his  like.  Stretched  on  the 
sofa,  she  watched  the  early  sinking  sun  in  South-western 
cloud,  and  the  changes  from  saffron  to  intensest  crimson, 
the  crown  of  a  November  evening,  and  one  of  frost.  Red- 
worth  struck  on  a  southward  line  from  chalk -ridge  to  sand, 
where  he  had  a  pleasant  footing  in  familiar  country,  under 
beeches  that  browned  the  ways,  along  beside  a  meadow- 
brook  fed  by  the  heights,  through  pines  and  across  deep 
sand-ruts  to  full  view  of  weald  and  Downs.  Diana  had 
been  with  him  here  in  her  maiden  days.  The  coloured 
back  of  a  coach  put  an  end  to  that  dream.  He  lightened 
his  pocket,  surveying  the  land  as  he  munched.  A  favour- 
able land  for  rails:  and  she  had  looked  over  it:  and  he 
was  now  becoming  a  wealthy  man :  and  she  was  a  married 
woman  straining  the  leash.  His  errand  would  not  bear 
examination,  it  seemed  such  a  desperate  long  shot.  He 
shut  his  inner  vision  on  it,  and  pricked  forward.  When 
the  burning  sunset  shot  waves  above  the  juniper  and  yews 
behind  him,  he  was  far  on  the  weald,  trotting  down  an 
interminable  road.  That  the  people  opposing  railways 
were  not  people  of  business,  was  his  reflection,  and  it 
returned  persistently:  for  practical  men,  even  the  most 
devoted  among  them,  will  think  for  themselves;  their 
army,  which  is  the  rational,  calls  them  to  its  banners,  in 
opposition  to  the  sentimental;  and  Redworth  joined  it  in 
the  abstract,  summoning  the  horrible  state  of  the  roads 
to  testify  against  an  enemy  wanting  almost  in  common 
humaneness.  A  slip  of  his  excellent  stepper  in  one  of  the 
half-frozen  pits  of  the  highway  was  the  principal  cause  of 
his  confusion  of  logic;  she  was  half  on  her  knees.  Be- 
yond the  market  town  the  roads  were  so  bad  that  he  quitted 
them,  and  with  the  indifference  of  an  engineer,  struck  a 


80  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

line  of  his  own  South-eastward  over  fields  and  ditches, 
favoured  by  a  round  horizon  moon  on  his  left.  So  for  a 
couple  of  hours  he  went  ahead  over  rolling  fallow  land  to 
the  meadow-flats  and  a  pale  shining  of  freshets;  then  hit 
on  a  lane  skirting  the  water,  and  reached  an  amphibious 
village;  five  miles  from  Storling,  he  was  informed,  and  a 
clear  traverse  of  lanes,  not  to  be  mistaken,  *'  if  he  kept  a 
sharp  eye  open.''  The  sharpness  of  his  eyes  was  divided 
between  the  sword-belt  of  the  starry  Hunter  and  the  shift- 
ing lanes  that  zig-zagged  his  course  below.  The  Downs 
were  softly  illumined;  still  it  amazed  him  to  think  of  a 
woman  like  Diana  Warwick  having  an  attachment  to  this 
district,  so  hard  of  yield,  mucky,  featureless,  fit  but  for 
the  rails  she  sided  with  her  friend  in  detesting.  Eeason- 
able  women,  too!  The  moon  stood  high  on  her  march  as 
he  entered  Storling.  He  led  his  good  beast  to  the  stables 
of  The  Three  Eavens,  thanking  her  and  caressing  her. 
The  ostler  conjectured  from  the  look  of  the  mare  that  he 
had  been  out  with  the  hounds  and  lost  his  way.  It 
appeared  to  Redworth  singularly,  that  near  the  ending  of 
a  wild  goose  chase,  his  plight  was  pretty  well  described 
by  the  fellow.  However,  he  had  to  knock  at  the  door  of 
The  Crossways  now,  in  the  silent  night  time,  a  certainly 
empty  house,  to  his  fancy.  He  fed  on  a  snack  of  cold  meat 
and  tea,  standing,  and  set  forth,  clearly  directed,  *'if  he 
kept  a  sharp  eye  open."  Hitherto  he  had  proved  his  capa- 
city, and  he  rather  smiled  at  the  repetition  of  the  formula 
to  him,  of  all  men.  A  turning  to  the  right  was  taken,  one 
to  the  left,  and  through  the  churchyard,  out  of  the  gate, 
round  to  the  right,  and  on.  By  this  route,  after  an  hour, 
he  found  himself  passing  beneath  the  bare  chestnuts  of  the 
churchyard  wall  of  Storling,  and  the  sparkle  of  the  edges 
of  the  dead  chestnut-leaves  at  his  feet  reminded  him  of 
the  very  ideas  he  had  entertained  when  treading  them. 
The  loss  of  an  hour  strung  him  to  pursue  the  chase  in 
earnest,  and  he  had  a  beating  of  the  heart  as  he  thought 
that  it  might  be  serious.  He  recollected  thinking  it  so  at 
Copsley.  The  long  ride,  and  nightfall,  with  nothing  in 
view,  had  obscured  his  mind  to  the  possible  behind  the 
thick  obstruction  of  the  probable ;  again  the  possible  waved 
its  marsh-light.     To  help  in  saving  her  from  a  fatal  step, 


A  TRACTTCAL   MAN  AND  A  DIVESTING   WOMAN       81 

supposinc^  a  dozen  combinations  of  the  conditional  mood, 
became  his  fixed  object,  since  here  he  was  —  of  that  there 
■was  no  doubt;  and  he  was  not  here  to  play  the  fool,  though 
the  errand  were  foolish.  He  entered  the  churchyard, 
crossed  the  shadow  of  the  tower,  and  hastened  along  the 
path,  fancying  he  beheld  a  couple  of  figures  vanishing 
before  him.  He  shouted;  he  hoped  to  obtain  directions 
from  these  natives :  the  moon  was  bright,  the  gravestones 
legible;  but  no  answer  came  back,  and  the  place  appeared 
to  belong  entirely  to  the  dead.  "I've  frightened  them," 
he  thought.  They  left  a  queerish  sensation  in  his  frame. 
A  ride  down  to  Sussex  to  see  ghosts  would  be  an  odd 
experience;  but  an  undigested  dinner  of  tea  is  the  very 
grandmother  of  ghosts;  and  he  accused  it  of  confusing 
him,  sight  and  mind.  Out  of  the  gate,  now  for  the  turn- 
ing to  the  right,  and  on.  He  turned.  He  must  have 
previously  turned  wrongly  somewhere  —  and  where?  A 
light  in  a  cottage  invited  him  to  apply  for  the  needed 
directions.  The  door  was  opened  by  a  woman,  who  had 
never  heard  tell  of  The  Crossways,  nor  had  her  husband, 
nor  any  of  the  children  crowding  round  them.  A  voice 
within  ejaculated :  "  Crassways !  "  and  soon  upon  the  grat- 
ing of  a  chair,  an  old  man,  whom  the  woman  named  her 
lodger,  by  way  of  introduction,  presented  himself  with  his 
hat  on,  saying:  "I  knows  the  spot  they  calls  Crassways," 
and  he  led.  Kedworth  understood  the  intention  that  a  job 
was  to  be  made  of  it,  and  submitting,  said:  "To  the  right, 
I  think."  He  was  bidden  to  come  along,  if  he  wanted 
"they  Crassways,"  and  from  the  right  they  turned  to  the 
left,  and  further  sharp  round,  and  on  to  a  turn,  where  the 
old  man,  otherwise  incommunicative,  said :  "  There,  down 
thik  theer  road,  and  a  post  in  the  middle." 

"I  want  a  house,  not  a  post!"  roared  Eedworth,  spying 
a  bare  space. 

The  old  man  despatched  a  finger  travelling  to  his  nob. 
"Naw,  there  ^s  ne'er  a  house.  But  that's  crassways  for 
four  roads,  if  it 's  crassways  you  wants." 

They  journeyed  backward.  They  were  in  such  a  maze 
of  lanes  that  the  old  man  was  master,  and  Kedworth  vowed 
to  be  rid  of  him  at  the  first  cottage.  This,  however,  they 
were  long  in  reaching,  and  the  old  man  was  promptly 

e 


82  DIANA  OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

througli  the  garden-gate,  hailing  the  people  and  securing 
information,  before  Redworth  could  well  hear.  He  smiled 
at  the  dogged  astuteness  of  a  dense-headed  old  creature 
determined  to  establish  a  claim  to  his  fee.  They  struck  a 
lane  sharp  to  the  left. 

"You're  Sussex?"  Eedworth  asked  him,  and  was 
answered:  "Naw;  the  Sheers." 

Emerging  from  deliberation,  the  old  man  said:  "Ah  'm 
a  Hampshireman." 

"  A  capital  county ! " 

"  Heigh !  "     The  old  man  heaved  his  chest.     "  Once ! " 

"  Why,  what  has  happened  to  it?  " 

"  Once  it  were  a  capital  county,  I  say.  Hah !  you  asks 
me  what  have  happened  to  it.  You  take  and  go  and  look 
at  it  now.  And  down  heer'll  be  no  better  soon,  I  tells 
'em.  When  ah  was  a  boy,  old  Hampshire  was  a  proud 
country,  wi'  the  old  coaches  and  the  old  squires,  and 
Harvest  Homes,  and  Christmas  merryings.  —  Cutting  up 
the  land !  There  's  no  pride  in  livin'  theer,  nor  anywhere, 
as  I  sees,  now." 

"You  mean  the  railways." 

" It 's  the  Devil  come  up  and  abroad  ower  all  England! " 
exclaimed  the  melancholy  ancient  patriot. 

A  little  cheering  was  tried  on  him,  but  vainly.  He  saw 
with  unerring  distinctness  the  triumph  of  the  Foul  Poten- 
tate, nay  his  personal  appearance  "  in  they  theer  puffin' 
engines."  The  country  which  had  produced  Andrew  Hedger, 
as  he  stated  his  name  to  be,  would  never  show  the  same 
old  cricketing  commons  it  did  when  he  was  a  boy.  Old 
England,  he  declared,  was  done  for. 

When  Eedworth  applied  to  his  watch  under  the  brilliant 
moonbeams,  he  discovered  that  he  had  been  listening  to 
this  natural  outcry  of  a  decaying  and  shunted  class  full 
three-quarters  of  an  hour,  and  The  Crossways  was  not  in 
si.s^ht.  He  remonstrated.  The  old  man  plodded  along. 
"We  must  do  as  we  're  directed,"  he  said. 

Further  walking  brought  them  to  a  turn.  Any  turn 
seemed  hopeful.  Another  turn  offered  the  welcome  sight 
of  a  blazing  doorway  on  a  rise  of  ground  off  the  road. 
Approaching  it,  the  old  man  requested  him  to  "bide  a  bit," 
and  stalked  the  ascent  at  long  strides.     A  vigorous  old 


A  PRACTICAL  MAN   AND   A  DIVINING   WOMAN      83 

fellow.  Kedworth  waited  below,  observing  how  he  joined 
the  group  at  the  lighted  door,  and,  as  it  was  apparent,  put 
his  question  of  the  whereabout  of  The  Crossways.  Finally, 
in  extreme  impatience,  he  walked  up  to  the  group  of  spec- 
tators. They  were  all,  and  Andrew  Hedger  among  them, 
the  most  entranced  and  profoundly  reverent,  observing  the 
dissection  of  a  pig. 

Unable  to  awaken  his  hearing,  Kedworth  jogged  his 
arm,  and  the  shake  was  ineffective  until  it  grew  in  force. 

"I  've  no  time  to  lose;  have  they  told  you  the  way?  " 

Andrew  Hedger  yielded  his  arm.  He  slowly  withdrew 
his  intent  fond  gaze  from  the  fair  outstretched  white  car- 
case, and  with  drooping  eyelids,  he  said:  "Ah  could  eat 
hog  a  solid  hower!" 

He  had  forgotten  to  ask  the  way,  intoxicated  by  the 
aspect  of  the  pig;  and  when  he  did  ask  it,  he  was  hard  of 
understanding,  given  wholly  to  his  last  glimpses. 

Kedworth  got  the  directions.  He  would  have  dismissed 
Mr.  Andrew  Hedger,  but  there  was  no  doing  so.  "  I  '11 
show  ye  on  to  the  Crossways  House,^^  the  latter  said,  imply- 
ing that  he  had  already  earned  something  by  showing  him 
the  Crossways  post. 

"Hog's  my  feed,"  said  Andrew  Hedger.  The  gastric 
springs  of  eloquence  moved  him  to  discourse,  and  he  un- 
burdened himself  between  succulent  pauses.  "  They  've 
killed  him  early.  He  's  fat;  and  he  might  ha'  been  fatter. 
But  he  's  fat.  They  've  got  their  Christmas  ready,  that 
they  have.  Lord!  you  should  see  the  chitterlings,  and 
the  sausages  hung  up  to  and  along  the  beams.  That 's  a 
crown  for  any  dwellin' !  They  runs  'em  round  the  top 
of  the  room  —  it 's  like  a  May-day  wreath  in  old  times. 
Home-fed  hog!  They  've  a  treat  in  store,  they  have. 
And  snap  your  fingers  at  the  world  for  many  a  long  day. 
And  the  hams !  They  cure  their  own  hams  at  that  house. 
Old  style  !  That 's  what  I  say  of  a  hog.  He  's  good  from 
end  to  end,  and  beats  a  Christian  hollow.  Everybody 
knows  it  and  owns  it." 

Kedworth  was  getting  tired.  In  sympathy  with  current 
conversation,  he  said  a  word  for  the  railways :  they  would 
certainly  make  the  flesh  of  swine  cheaper,  bring  a  heap 
of  hams  into  the  market.     But  Andrew  Hedger  remarked 


84  DIANA  OF   THE   CROSSWAYS 

with  contempt  that  he  had  not  much  opinion  of  foreign 
hams:  nobody  knew  what  they  fed  on.  Hog,  he  said, 
would  feed  on  anything,  where  there  was  no  choice  — 
they  had  wonderful  stomachs  for  food.  Only,  when  they 
had  a  choice,  they  left  the  worst  for  last,  and  home-fed 
filled  them  with  stuff  to  make  good  meat  and  fat  —  "what 
we  calls  prime  bacon."  As  it  is  not  right  to  damp  a  native 
enthusiasm,  Redworth  let  him  dilate  on  his  theme,  and 
mused  on  his  boast  to  eat  hog  a  solid  hour,  which  roused 
some  distant  classic  recollection  :  —  an  odd  jumble. 

They  crossed  the  wooden  bridge  of  a  flooded  stream. 

"Now  ye  have  it,"  said  the  hog-worshipper;  "that  may 
be  the  house,  I  reckon." 

A  dark  mass  of  building,  with  the  moon  behind  it, 
shining  in  spires  through  a  mound  of  firs,  met  Redworth's 
gaze.  The  windows  all  were  blind,  no  smoke  rose  from 
the  chimneys.  He  noted  the  dusky  square  of  green,  and 
the  finger-post  signalling  the  centre  of  the  four  roads. 
Andrew  Hedger  repeated  that  it  was  the  Crossways  house, 
ne'er  a  doubt.  Eedworth  paid  him  his  expected  fee,  where- 
upon Andrew,  shouldering  off,  wished  him  a  hearty  good 
night,  and  forthwith  departed  at  high  pedestrian  pace, 
manifestly  to  have  a  concluding  look  at  the  beloved 
anatomy. 

There  stood  the  house.  Absolutely  empty!  thought 
Eedworth.  The  sound  of  the  gate-bell  he  rang  was  like 
an  echo  to  him.  The  gate  was  unlocked.  He  felt  a  return 
of  his  queer  churchyard  sensation  when  walking  up  the 
garden-path,  in  the  shadow  of  the  house.  Here  she  was 
born:  here  her  father  died:  and  this  was  the  station  of 
her  dreams,  as  a  girl  at  school  near  London  and  in  Paris. 
Her  heart  was  here.  He  looked  at  the  windows  facing 
the  Downs  with  dead  eyes.  The  vivid  idea  of  her  was  a 
phantom  presence,  and  cold,  assuring  him  that  the  bodily 
Diana  was  absent.  Had  Lady  Dunstane  guessed  rightly, 
he  might  perhaps  have  been  of  service ! 

Anticipating  the  blank  silence,  he  rang  the  house-bell. 
It  seemed  to  set  wagging  a  weariful  tongue  in  a  corpse. 
The  bell  did  its  duty  to  the  last  note,  and  one  thin  revival 
stroke,  for  a  finish,  as  in  days  when  it  responded  livingly 
to  the   guest.     He   pulled,   and  had  the   reply,    just  the 


A  PRACTICAL  MAN  AND   A   DIVINING   WOMAN      85 

same,  with  the  faint  terminal  touch,  resembling  exactly  a 
"There!  '"  at  the  close  of  a  voluble  delivery  in  the  nega- 
tive. Absolutely  empty.  He  pulled  and  pulled.  The 
bell  wagged,  wagged.  This  had  been  a  house  of  a  witty 
host,  a  merry  girl,  junketting  guests;  a  house  of  hilarious 
thunders,  lightnings  of  fun  and  fancy.  Death  never  seemed 
more  voiceful  than  in  that  wagging  of  the  bell. 

For  conscience'  sake,  as  became  a  trusty  emissary,  he 
walked  round  to  the  back  of  the  house,  to  verify  the  total 
emptiness.  His  apprehensive  despondency  had  said  that 
it  was  absolutely  empty,  but  upon  consideration  he  sup- 
posed the  house  must  have  some  guardian:  likely  enough, 
an  old  gardener  and  his  wife,  lost  in  deafness  double- 
shotted  by  sleep!  There  was  no  sign  of  them.  The  night 
air  waxed  sensibly  crisper.  He  thumped  the  back-doors. 
Blank  :hollowness  retorted  on  the  blow.  He  banged  and 
kicked.  The  violent  altercation  with  wood  and  wall  lasted 
several  minutes,  ending  as  it  had  begun.  Flesh  may 
worry,  but  is  sure  to  be  worsted  in  such  an  argument. 

"  Well,  my  dear  lady !  "  —  Redworth  addressed  Lady 
Dunstane  aloud,  while  driving  his  hands  into  his  pockets 
for  warmth  —  "  we  've  done  what  we  could.  The  next  best 
thing  is  to  go  to  bed  and  see  what  morning  brings  us." 

The  temptation  to  glance  at  the  wild  divinings  of  dreamy- 
witted  women  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  practical  man, 
■was  aided  by  the  intense  frigidity  of  the  atmosphere  in 
leading  him  to  criticize  a  sex  not  much  used  to  the  exer- 
cise of  brains.  "  And  they  hate  railways  !  "  He  associated 
them,  in  the  matter  of  intelligence,  with  Andrew  Hedger 
and  Company.  They  sank  to  the  level  of  the  temperature 
in  his  esteem  —  as  regarded  their  intellects.  He  approved 
their  warmth  of  heart.  The  nipping  of  the  victim's  toes 
and  finger-tips  testified  powerfully  to  that. 

Round  to  the  front  of  the  house  at  a  trot,  he  stood  in 
moonlight.  Then,  for  involuntarily  he  now  did  every- 
thing running,  with  a  dash  up  the  steps  he  seized  the  sul- 
len pendant  bell-handle,  and  worked  it  pumpwise,  till  he 
perceived  a  smaller  bell-knob  beside  the  door,  at  which 
he  worked  piston-wise.  Pump  and  piston,  the  hurly-burly 
and  the  tinkler  created  an  alarm  to  scare  cat  and  mouse 
and  Cardinal   spider,   all   that  run  or  weave  in  desolate 


86  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

houses,  with  the  good  result  of  a  certain  degree  of  heat  to 
his  frame.  He  ceased,  panting.  No  stir  within,  nor  light. 
That  white  stare  of  windows  at  the  moon  was  undisturbed. 

The  Downs  were  like  a  wavy  robe  of  shadowy  grey  silk. 
No  wonder  that  she  had  loved  to  look  on  them  ! 

And  it  was  no  wonder  that  Andrew  Hedger  enjoyed 
prime  bacon.  Bacon  frizzling,  fat  rashers  of  real  home- 
fed  on  the  fire  —  none  of  your  foreign  —  suggested  a  genial 
refreshment  and  resistance  to  antagonistic  elements.  Nor 
was  it,  granting  health,  granting  a  sharp  night  —  the 
temperature  at  least  fifteen  below  zero  —  an  excessive 
boast  for  a  man  to  say  he  could  go  on  eating  for  a  solid 
hour. 

These  were  notions  darting  through  a  half  nourished 
gentleman  nipped  in  the  frame  by  a  severely  frosty  night. 
Truly  a  most  beautiful  night!  She  would  have  delighted 
to  see  it  here.  The  Downs  were  like  floating  islands,  like 
fairy-laden  vapours;  solid,  as  Andrew  Hedger's  hour  of 
eating;  visionary,  as  too  often  his  desire! 

Redworth  muttered  to  himself,  after  taking  the  picture 
of  the  house  and  surrounding  country  from  the  sward,  that 
he  thought  it  about  the  sharpest  night  he  had  ever  encoun- 
tered in  England.  He  was  cold,  hungry,  dispirited,  and 
astoundingly  stricken  with  an  incapacity  to  separate  any 
of  his  thoughts  from  old  Andrew  Hedger.  Nature  was  at 
her  pranks  upon  him. 

He  left  the  garden  briskly,  as  to  the  legs,  and  reluc- 
tantly. He  would  have  liked  to  know  whether  Diana  had 
recently  visited  the  house,  or  was  expected.  It  could  be 
learnt  in  the  morning;  but  his  mission  was  urgent  and  he 
on  the  wings  of  it.     He  was  vexed  and  saddened. 

Scarcely  had  he  closed  the  garden-gate  when  the  noise 
of  an  opening  window  arrested  him,  and  he  called.  The 
answer  was  in  a  feminine  voice,  youngish,  not  disagreeable, 
though  not  Diana's. 

He  heard  none  of  the  words,  but  rejoined  in  a  bawl: 
"  Mrs.  Warwick  !  —  Mr.  Redworth  !  " 

That  was  loud  enough  for  the  deaf  or  the  dead 

The  window  closed.  He  went  to  the  door  and  wailed. 
It  swung  wide  to  him;  and,  0  marvel  of  a  woman's 
divination  of  a  woman!  there  stood  Diana* 


A  POSITION  OF  DELICACY  87 


CHAPTER  IX 

SHOWS  HOW  A  POSITION  OF  DELICACY  FOE  A  LADY  AND 
GENTLEMAN  WAS  MET  IN  SIMPLE  FASHION  WITHOUT 
HURT   TO   EITHER 

Redworth's  impulse  was  to  laugh  for  very  gladness  of 
heart,  as  he  proffered  excuses  for  his  tremendous  alarums : 
and  in  doing  so,  the  worthy  gentleman  imagined  he  must 
have  persisted  in  clamouring  for  admission  because  he 
suspected,  that  if  at  home,  she  would  require  a  violent 
summons  to  betray  herself.  It  was  necessary  to  him  to 
follow  his  abashed  sagacity  up  to  the  mark  of  his  happy 
animation. 

"Had  I  known  it  was  you!"  said  Diana,  bidding  him 
enter  the  passage.  She  wore  a  black  silk  mantilla  and 
was  warmly  covered. 

She  called  to  her  maid  Danvers,  whom  Eedworth  remem- 
bered: a  firm  woman  of  about  forty,  wrapped,  like  her 
mistress,  in  head-covering,  cloak,  scarf,  and  shawl.  Tell- 
ing her  to  scour  the  kitchen  for  firewood,  Diana  led  into 
a  sitting-room.  "  I  need  not  ask  —  you  have  come  from 
Lady  Dunstane,"  she  said.     "Is  she  well?" 

*'She  is  deeply  anxious." 

"  You  are  cold.  Empty  houses  are  colder  than  out  of 
doors.     You  shall  soon  have  a  fire." 

She  begged  him  to  be  seated. 

The  small  glow  of  candle-light  made  her  dark  rich 
colouring  orange  in  shadow. 

"  House  and  grounds  are  open  to  a  tenant,"  she  resumed. 
"I  say  good-bye  to  them  to-morrow  morning.  The  old 
couple  who  are  in  charge  sleep  in  the  village  to-night.  I 
did  not  want  them  here.  You  have  quitted  the  Govern- 
ment service,  I  think?  " 

"A  year  or  so  since." 

"  When  did  you  return  from  America?  " 

"Two  days  back." 

"And  paid  your  visit  to  Copsley  immediately?" 

"As  early  as  I  could." 


88  x)IANA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

"  That  was  true  friendliness.     You  have  a  letter  for  me ? '' 

"I  have." 

He  put  his  hand  to  his  pocket  for  the  letter. 

"Presently,"  she  said.  She  divined  the  contents,  and 
nursed  her  resolution  to  withstand  them.  Danvers  had 
brought  firewood  and  coal.  Orders  were  given  to  her,  and 
in  spite  of  the  opposition  of  the  maid  and  intervention  of 
the  gentleman,  Diana  knelt  at  the  grate,  observing :  "  Allow 
me  to  do  this.     I  can  lay  and  light  a  fire." 

He  was  obliged  to  look  on :  she  was  a  woman  who  spoke 
her  meaning.  She  knelt,  handling  paper,  firewood  and 
matches,  like  a  housemaid.  Danvers  proceeded  on  her 
mission,  and  Redworth  eyed  Diana  in  the  first  fire-glow. 
He  could  have  imagined  a  Madonna  on  an  old  black  Spanish 
canvas. 

The  act  of  service  was  beautiful  in  gracefulness,  and 
her  simplicity  in  doing  the  work  touched  it  spiritually. 
He  thought,  as  she  knelt  there,  that  never  had  he  seen 
how  lovely  and  how  charged  with  mystery  her  features 
were;  the  dark  large  eyes  full  on  the  brows;  the  proud 
line  of  a  straight  nose  in  right  measure  to  the  bow  of  the 
lips;  reposeful  red  lips,  shut,  and  their  curve  of  the  slum- 
ber-smile at  the  corners.  Her  forehead  was  broad;  the 
chin  of  a  sufficient  firmness  to  sustain  that  noble  square ; 
the  brows  marked  by  a  soft  thick  brush  to  the  temples; 
her  black  hair  plainly  drawn  along  her  head  to  the  knot, 
revealed  by  the  mantilla  fallen  on  her  neck. 

Elegant  in  plainness,  the  classic  poet  would  have  said 
of  her  hair  and  dress.  She  was  of  the  women  whose  wits 
are  quick  in  everything  they  do.  That  which  was  proper 
to  her  position,  complexion,  and  the  hour,  surely  marked 
her  appearance.  Unaccountably  this  night,  the  fair  fleshly 
presence  over-weighted  her  intellectual  distinction,  to  an 
observer  bent  on  vindicating  her  innocence.  Or  rather,  he 
saw  the  hidden  in  the  visible. 

Owner  of  such  a  woman,  and  to  lose  her!  Redworth 
pitied  the  husband. 

The  crackling  flames  reddened  her  whole  person.  Gaz- 
ing, he  remembered  Lady  Dunstane  saying  of  her  once, 
that  in  anger  she  had  the  nostrils  of  a  war  horse.  The 
nostrils  now  were  faintly  alive  under  some  sensitive   im* 


A  POSITION   OF  DELICACY  89 

pression  of  her  musings.  The  olive  cheeks,  pale  as  she 
stood  in  the  doorway,  were  flushed  by  the  fire-beams, 
though  no  longer  with  their  swarthy  central  rose,  tropic 
flower  of  a  pure  and  abounding  blood,  as  it  had  seemed. 
She  was  now  beset  by  battle.  His  pity  for  her,  and  his 
eager  championship,  overwhelmed  the  spirit  of  compassion 
for  the  foolish  wretched  husband.  Dolt,  the  man  must  be, 
Ked worth  thought;  and  he  asked  inwardly.  Did  the  miser- 
able tjTSint  suppose  of  a  woman  like  this,  that  she  would 
be  content  to  shine  as  a  candle  in  a  grated  lanthorn?  The 
generosity  of  men  speculating  upon  other  men^s  posses- 
sions is  known.  Yet  the  man  who  loves  a  woman  has 
to  the  full  the  husband's  jealousy  of  her  good  name.  And 
a  lover,  that  without  the  claims  of  the  alliance,  can  be 
wounded  on  her  behalf,  is  less  distracted  in  his  homage 
by  the  personal  luminary,  to  which  man's  manufacture  of 
balm  and  incense  is  mainly  drawn  when  his  love  is 
wounded.  That  contemplation  of  her  incomparable  beauty, 
with  the  multitude  of  his  ideas  fluttering  round  it,  did 
somewhat  shake  the  personal  luminary  in  Redworth.  He 
was  conscious  of  pangs.  The  question  bit  him :  How  far 
had  she  been  indiscreet  or  wilful?  and  the  bite  of  it  was 
a  keen  acid  to  his  nerves.  A  woman  doubted  by  her  hus- 
band, is  always,  and  even  to  her  champions  in  the  first 
hours  of  the  noxious  rumour,  until  they  have  solidified  in 
confidence  through  service,  a  creature  of  the  wilds,  marked 
for  our  ancient  running.  Nay,  more  than  a  cynical  world, 
these  latter  will  be  sensible  of  it.  The  doubt  casts  her 
forth,  the  general  yelp  drags  her  down;  she  runs  like  the 
prey  of  the  forest  under  spotting  branches ;  clear  if  we 
can  think  so,  but  it  has  to  be  thought  in  devotedness :  her 
character  is  abroad.  Redworth  bore  a  strong  resemblance 
to  his  fellowmen,  except  for  his  power  of  faith  in  this 
woman.  Nevertheless  it  required  the  superbness  of  her  .- 
beauty  and  the  contrasting  charm  of  her  humble  posture 
of  kneeling  by  the  fire,  to  set  him  on  his  right  track  of 
mind.  He  knew  and  was  sure  of  her.  He  dispersed  the 
unhallowed  fry  in  attendance  upon  any  stirring  of  the  rep- 
tile part  of  us,  to  look  at  her  with  the  eyes  of  a  friend. 
And  if  .  .  .  !  —  a  little  mouse  of  a  thought  scampered  out 
of  one  of  tlie  chambers  of  his  head  and  darted  along  the 


90  DIANA  OP  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

passages,  fetching  a  sweat  to  his  brows.  Well,  whatsoever 
the  fact,  his  heart  was  hers !  He  hoped  he  could  be  char- 
itable to  women. 

She  rose  from  her  knees  and  said:  "Now,  please,  give 
me  the  letter.'' 

He  was  entreated  to  excuse  her  for  consigning  him  to 
firelight  when  she  left  the  room. 

Danvers  brought  in  a  dismal  tallow  candle,  remarking 
that  her  mistress  had  not  expected  visitors :  her  mistress 
had  nothing  but  tea  and  bread  and  butter  to  offer  him. 
Danvers  uttered  no  complaint  of  her  sufferings ;  happy  in 
being  the  picture  of  them. 

"I'm  not  hungry,"  said  he. 

A  plate  of  Andrew  Hedger's  own  would  not  have  tempted 
him.  The  foolish  frizzle  of  bacon  sang  in  his  ears  as  he 
walked  from  end  to  end  of  the  room;  an  illusion  of  his 
fancy  pricked  by  a  frost-edged  appetite.  But  the  antici- 
pated contest  with  Diana  checked  and  numbed  the  craving. 

Was  Warwick  a  man  to  proceed  to  extremities  on  a  mad 
suspicion?  —  What  kind  of  proof  had  he? 

Redworth  summoned  the  portrait  of  Mr.  Warwick  be- 
fore him,  and  beheld  a  sweeping  of  close  eyes  in  cloud, 
a  long  upper  lip  in  cloud;  the  rest  of  him  was  all  cloud. 
As  usual  with  these  conjurations  of  a  face,  the  index  of 
the  nature  conceived  by  him  displayed  itself,  and  no  more ; 
but  he  took  it  for  the  whole  physiognomy,  and  pronounced 
of  the  husband  thus  delineated,  that  those  close  eyes  of 
the  long  upper  lip  would  both  suspect  and  proceed  madly. 

He  was  invited  by  Danvers  to  enter  the  dining-room. 

There  Diana  joined  him. 

"  The  best  of  a  dinner  on  bread  and  butter  is,  that  one 
is  ready  for  supper  soon  after  it,"  she  said,  swimming  to 
the  tea-tray.     "You  have  dined?" 

"At  the  inn,"  he  replied. 

"The  Three  Eavens!  When  my  father's  guests  from 
London  flooded  The  Crossways,  The  Three  Ravens  pro- 
vided the  overflow  with  beds.  On  nights  like  this  I  have 
got  up  and  scraped  the  frost  from  my  window-panes  to  see 
them  step  into  the  old  fly,  singing  some  song  of  his.  The 
inn  had  a  good  reputation  for  hospitality  in  those  days.  I 
hope  they  treated  you  well?  " 


A  POSITION  OF  DELICACY  91 

"  Excellently,"  said  Redworth,  taking  an  enormous  mouth- 
ful, while  his  heart  sank  to  see  that  she  who  smiled  to 
encourage  his  eating  had  been  weeping.  But  she  also 
consumed  her  bread  and  butter. 

"  That  poor  maid  of  mine  is  an  instance  of  a  woman  able 
to  do  things  against  the  grain,"  she  said.  "Danvers  is  a 
foster-child  of  luxury.  She  loves  it;  great  houses,  plen- 
tiful meals,  and  the  crowd  of  twinkling  footmen's  calves. 
Yet  you  see  her  here  in  a  desolate  house,  consenting  to 
cold,  and  I  know  not  what,  terrors  of  ghosts!  poor  soul. 
I  have  some  mysterious  attraction  for  her.  She  would  not 
let  me  come  alone.  I  should  have  had  to  hire  some  old 
Storling  grannam,  or  retain  the  tattling  keepers  of  the 
house.  She  loves  her  native  country  too,  and  disdains  the 
foreigner.     My  tea  you  may  trust." 

Redworth  had  not  a  doubt  of  it.  He  was  becoming  a 
tea-taster.  The  merit  of  warmth  pertained  to  the  bever- 
age. "I  think  you  get  your  tea  from  Scoppin's,  in  the 
City,"  he  said. 

That  was  the  warehouse  for  Mrs.  Warwick's  tea.  They 
conversed  of  Teas;  the  black,  the  green,  the  mixtures; 
each  thinking  of  the  attack  to  come,  and  the  defence. 
Meantime ,  the  cut  bread  and  butter  having  flown,  Redworth 
attacked  the  loaf.     He  apologized. 

"  Oh  !  pay  me  a  practical  compliment,"  Diana  said,  and 
looked  really  happy  at  his  unfeigned'  relish  of  her  simple 
fare. 

She  had  given  him  one  opportunity  in  speaking  of  her 
maid's  love  of  native  country.     But  it  came  too  early. 

"  They  say  that  bread  and  butter  is  fattening,"  he 
remarked. 

^'  You  preserve  the  mean,"  said  she. 

He  admitted  that  his  health  was  good.  For  some  little 
time,  to  his  vexation  at  the  absurdity,  she  kept  him  talking 
of  himself.  So  flowing  was  she,  and  so  sweet  the  motion 
of  her  mouth  in  utterance,  that  he  followed  her  lead,  and 
he  said  odd  things  and  corrected  them.  He  had  to  describe 
his  ride  to  her. 

"  Yes !  the  view  of  the  Downs  from  Dewhurst,"  she 
exclaimed.  "  Or  any  point  along  the  ridge.  Emma  and  I 
once  drove  there  in  Summer,  with  clotted  cream  from  her 


92  DIANA  OP  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

dairy,  and  we  bought  fresh-plucked  wortleberries,  aii(> 
stewed  them  in  a  hollow  of  the  furzes,  and  ate  them  with 
ground  biscuits  and  the  clotted  cream  iced,  and  thought  it 
a  luncheon  for  seraphs.  Then  you  dropped  to  the  road 
round  under  the  sand-heights  —  and  meditated  railways  ! " 

"  Just  a  notion  or  two." 

"  You  have  been  very  successful  in  America  ?  " 

"  Successful ;  perhaps  ;  we  exclude  extremes  in  our  cal- 
culations of  the  still  problematical." 

"1  am  sure,"  said  she,  "you  always  have  faith  in  your 
calculations." 

Her  innocent  archness  dealt  him  a  stab  sharper  than  any 
he  had  known  since  the  day  of  his  hearing  of  her  engage- 
ment. He  muttered  of  his  calculations  being  human ;  he 
was  as  much  of  a  fool  as  other  men  —  more ! 

"  Oh  !  no,"  said  she. 

"  Positively." 

"I  cannot  think  it." 

« I  know  it." 

"  Mr.  Redworth,  you  will  never  persuade  me  to  believe 
it." 

He  knocked  a  rising  groan  on  the  head,  and  rejoined: 
"  I  hope  I  may  not  have  to  say  so  to-night." 

Diana  felt  the  edge  of  the  dart.  "  And  meditating  rail- 
ways, you  scored  our  poor  land  of  herds  and  flocks ;  and 
night  fell,  and  the  moon  sprang  up,  and  on  you  came.  It 
was  clever  of  you  to  find  your  way  by  the  moonbeams." 

'^That's  about  the  one  thing  I  seem  fit  for !  " 

"  But  what  delusion  is  this,  in  the  mind  of  a  man  suc- 
ceeding in  everything  he  does ! "  cried  Diana,  carious 
despite  her  wariness.  "  Is  there  to  be  the  revelation  of  a 
hairshirt  ultimately  ?  —  a  Journal  of  Confessions  ?  You 
succeeded  in  everything  you  aimed  at,  and  broke  your 
heart  over  one  chance  miss  ?  " 

"  My  heart  is  not  of  the  stuff  to  break,"  he  said,  and 
laughed  off  her  fortuitous  thrust  straight  into  it.  "  Another 
cup,  yes.     I  came  ..." 

"By  night,"  said  she,  "and  cleverly  found  your  way, 
and  dined  at  The  Three  Ravens,  and  walked  to  The 
Crossways,  and  met  no  ghosts." 

"  On  the  contrary  —  or  at  least  I  saw  a  couple.'^ 


A  POSITION   OF  DELICACY  93 

"  Tell  me  of  them  ;  we  breed  them  here.  We  sell  them 
periodically  to  the  newspapers." 

"  Well,  I  started  them  in  their  natal  locality.  I  saw 
them,  going  down  the  churchyard,  and  bellowed  after  them 
with  all  my  lungs.  I  wanted  directions  to  The  Crossways  ; 
I  had  missed  my  way  at  some  turning.  In  an  instant  they 
were  vapour." 

Diana  smiled.  "  It  was  indeed  a  voice  to  startle  delicate 
apparitions  !  So  do  roar  Hyrcanean  tigers,  Pyramus  and 
Thisbe-slaying  lions  !  One  of  your  ghosts  carried  a  loaf  of 
bread,  and  dropped  it  in  fright;  one  carried  a  pound  of 
fresh  butter  for  home  consumption.  They  were  in  the 
churchyard  for  one  in  passing  to  kneel  at  her  father's  grave 
and  kiss  his  tombstone." 

She  bowed  her  head,  forgetful  of  her  guard. 

The  pause  presented  an  opening.  Redworth  left  his 
chair  and  walked  to  the  mantelpiece.  It  was  easier  to 
him  to  speak,  not  facing  her. 

"You  have  read  Lady  Dunstane's  letter,"  he  began. 

She  nodded.     "  I  have." 

*'  Can  you  resist  her  appeal  to  you  ?  " 

"  I  must." 

"She  is  not  in  a  condition  to  bear  it  well.  You  will 
pardon  me,  Mrs.  Warwick  .  .  ." 

'^  Fully!     Fully!" 

"  I  venture  to  offer  merely  practical  advice.  You  have 
thought  of  it  all,  but  have  not  felt  it.  In  these  cases,  the 
one  thing  to  do  is  to  make  a  stand.  Lady  Dunstane  has  a 
clear  head.  She  sees  what  has  to  be  endured  by  you. 
Consider:  she  appeals  to  me  to  bring  you  her  letter. 
Would  she  have  chosen  me,  or  any  man,  for  her  messenger, 
if  it  had  not  appeared  to  her  a  matter  of  life  and  death?  — 
You  count  me  among  your  friends." 

"  One  of  the  truest." 

"  Here  are  two,  then,  and  your  own  good  sense.  For  I 
do  not  believe  it  to  be  a  question  of  courage." 

"  He  has  commenced.    Let  him  carry  it  out,"  said  Diana. 

Her  desperation  could  have  added  the  cry  —  And  give 
me  freedom  !  That  was  the  secret  in  her  heart.  She  had 
struck  on  the  hope  for  the  detested  yoke  to  be  broken  at 
any  cost. 


94  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

"I  decline  to  meet  his  charges.  I  despise  them.  If  my 
friends  have  faith  in  me  —  and  they  may !  «^  I  want 
nothing  more." 

"  Well,  I  won't  talk  commonplaces  about  the  world," 
said  Redworth.  "We  can  none  of  us  afford  to  have  it 
against  us.  Consider  a  moment :  to  your  friends  you  are 
the  Diana  Merion  they  knew,  and  they  will  not  suffer  an 
injury  to  your  good  name  without  a  struggle.  But  if  you 
fly  ?  You  leave  the  dearest  you  have  to  the  whole  brunt 
of  it." 

"  They  will,  if  they  love  me." 

"  They  will.  But  think  of  the  shock  to  her.  Lady 
Dunstane  reads  you  .  .   ." 

"  Not  quite.  No,  not  if  she  even  wishes  me  to  stay ! " 
said  Diana. 

He  was  too  intent  on  his  pleading  to  perceive  a  signifi- 
cation. 

"She  reads  you  as  clearly  in  the  dark  as  if  you  were 
present  with  her." 

"  Oh !  why  am  I  not  ten  years  older ! "  Diana  cried,  and 
tried  to  face  round  to  him,  and  stopped  paralyzed.  "  Ten 
years  older,  I  could  discuss  my  situation,  as  an  old  woman 
of  the  world,  and  use  my  wits  to  defend  myself." 

"  And  then  you  would  not  dream  of  flight  before  it !  " 

"No,  she  does  not  read  me  :  no!  She  saw  that  I  might 
come  to  The  Crossways.  She  —  no  one  but  myself  can 
see  the  wisdom  of  my  holding  aloof,  in  contempt  of  this 
baseness." 

"  And  of  allowing  her  to  sink  under  that  which  your 
presence  would  arrest.     Her  strength  will  not  support  it." 

"  Emma !  Oh,  cruel ! "  Diana  sprang  up  to  give  play  to 
her  limbs.  She  dropped  on  another  chair.  "  Go  I  must,  I 
cannot  turn  back.  She  saw  my  old  attachment  to  this 
place.  It  was  not  difficult  to  guess  .  .  .  Who  but  I  can 
see  the  wisest  course  for  me  ! " 

"  It  comes  to  this,  that  the  blow  aimed  at  you  in  your 
absence  will  strike  her,  and  mortally, "  said  Redworth. 

"  Then  I  say  it  is  terrible  to  have  a  friend,"  said  Diana, 
with  her  bosom  heaving. 

"Friendship,  I  fancy,  means  one  heart  between  two." 

His  unstressed  observation  hit  a  bell  in  her  head,  and  set 


THE  CONFLICT  OF  THE  NIGHT  95 

it  reverberating.  She  and  Emma  had  spoken,  written,  the 
very  words.  She  drew  forth  her  Emma's  letter  from  under 
her  left  breast,  and  read  some  half-blinded  lines. 

Eedworth  immediately  prepared  to  leave  her  to  her 
feelings  —  trustier  guides  than  her  judgement  in  this  crisis. 

"  Adieu,  for  the  night,  Mrs.  Warwick,''  he  said,  and  was 
guilty  of  eulogizing  the  judgement  he  thought  erratic  for  the 
moment.  "Night  is  a  calm  adviser.  Let  me  presume  to 
come  again  in  the  morning.  I  dare  not  go  back  without 
you." 

She  looked  up.  As  they  faced  together  each  saw  that  the 
other  had  passed  through  a  furnace,  scorching  enough  to 
him,  though  hers  was  the  delicacy  exposed.  The  reflection 
had  its  weight  with  her  during  the  night. 

"  Dan  vers  is  getting  ready  a  bed  for  you;  she  is  airing 
linen,"  Diana  said.  But  the  bed  was  declined,  and  the 
hospitality  was  not  pressed.  The  offer  of  it  seemed  to  him 
significant  of  an  unwary  cordiality  and  thoughtlessness  of 
tattlers  that  might  account  possibly  for  many  things  — 
supposing  a  fool  or  madman,  or  malignants,  to  interpret 
them. 

"  Then,  good  night,"  said  she. 

They  joined  hands.  He  exacted  no  promise  that  she 
would  be  present  in  the  morning  to  receive  him  ;  and  it  was 
a  consolation  to  her  desire  for  freedom,  until  she  reflected 
on  the  perfect  confidence  it  implied,  and  felt  as  a  quivering 
butterfly  impalpably  pinned. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE    CONFLICT    OF    THE    NIGHT 

Her  brain  was  a  steam-wheel  throughout  the  night; 
everything  that  could  be  thought  of  was  tossed,  nothing 
grasped. 

The  unfriendliness  of  the  friends  who  sought  to  retain 
her  recurred.  For  look  —  to  fly  could  not  be  interpreted  as 
a  flight.     It  was  but  a  stepping  aside,  a  disdain  of  defend- 


96  DIANA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

ing  herself,  and  a  wrapping  herself  in  her  dignity.  Women 
would  be  with  her.  She  called  on  the  noblest  of  them  to 
justify  the  course  she  chose,  and  they  did,  in  an  almost 
audible  murmur. 

And  0  the  rich  reward.  A  black  archway-gate  swung 
open  to  the  glittering  fields  of  freedom. 

Emma  was  not  of  the  chorus.  Emma  meditated  as  an 
invalid.  How  often  had  Emma  bewailed  to  her  that  the 
most  grievous  burden  of  her  malady  was  her  fatal  tendency 
to  brood  sickly  upon  human  complications  !  She  could  not 
see  the  blessedness  of  the  prospect  of  freedom  to  a  woman 
abominably  yoked.  What  if  a  miserable  woman  were 
dragged  through  mire  to  reach  it !  Married,  the  mire  was 
her  portion,  whatever  she  might  do.  That  man  —  but  pass 
him  ! 

And  that  other  —  the  dear,  the  kind,  careless,  high- 
hearted old  friend.  He  could  honestly  protest  his  guiltless- 
ness, and  would  smilingly  leave  the  case  to  go  its  ways.  Of 
this  she  was  sure,  that  her  decision  and  her  pleasure  would 
be  his.  They  were  tied  to  the  stake.  She  had  already 
tasted  some  of  the  mortal  agony.  Did  it  matter  whether 
the  flames  consumed  her  ? 

Eeflecting  on  the  interview  with  Kedworth,  though  she 
had  performed  her  part  in  it  placidly,  her  skin  burned.  It 
was  the  beginning  of  tortures  if  she  stayed  in  England. 

By  staying  to  defend  herself  she  forfeited  her  attitude  of 
dignity  and  lost  all  chance  of  her  reward.  And  name  the 
sort  of  world  it  is,  dear  friends,  for  which  we  are  to  sacrifice 
our  one  hope  of  freedom,  that  we  may  preserve  our  fair 
fame  in  it ! 

Diana  cried  aloud,  "  My  freedom !  "  feeling  as  a  butterfly 
flown  out  of  a  box  to  stretches  of  sunny  earth  beneath 
spacious  heavens.  Her  bitter  marriage,  joyless  in  all  its 
chapters,  indefensible  where  the  man  was  right  as  well  as 
where  insensately  wrong,  had  been  imprisonment.  She 
excused  him  down  to  his  last  madness,  if  only  the  bonds 
were  broken.  Here,  too,  in  this  very  house  of  her  happi- 
ness with  her  father,  she  had  bound  herself  to  the  man  : 
voluntarily,  quite  inexplicably.  Voluntarily,  as  we  say. 
But  there  must  be  a  spell  upon  us  at  times.  Upon  young 
women  there  certainly  is. 


THE  CONFLICT   OF   THE  NIGHT  97 

The  wild  brain  of  Diana,  armed  by  her  later  enlightenment 
as  to  the  laws  of  life  and  nature,  dashed  in  revolt  at  the 
laws  of  the  world  when  she  thought  of  the  forces,  natural 
and  social,  urging  young  women  to  marry  and  be  bound  to 
the  end. 

It  should  be  a  spotless  world  which  is  thus  ruthless. 

But  were  the  world  impeccable  it  would  behave  more 
generously. 

The  world  is  ruthless,  dear  friends,  because  the  world  is 
hypocrite!  The  world  cannot  afford  to  be  magnanimous, 
or  even  just. 

Her  dissensions  with  her  husband,  their  differences  of 
opinion,  and  puny  wranglings,  hoistings  of  two  standards, 
reconciliations  for  the  sake  of  decency,  breaches  of  the 
truce,  and  his  detested  meanness,  the  man  behind  the 
mask ;  and  glimpses  of  herself  too,  the  half-known,  half- 
suspected,  developing  creature  claiming  to  be  Diana,  and 
unlike  her  dreamed  Diana,  deformed  by  marriage,  irritable, 
acerb,  rebellious,  constantly  justifiable  against  him,  but  not 
in  her  own  mind,  and  therefore  accusing  him  of  the  double 
crime  of  provoking  her  and  perverting  her  —  these  were 
the  troops  defiling  through  her  head  while  she  did  battle 
with  the  hypocrite  world. 

One  painful  sting  was  caused  by  the  feeling  that  she 
could  have  loved  —  whom  ?  An  ideal.  Had  he,  the  ima- 
gined but  unvisioned,  been  her  yoke-fellow,  would  she  now 
lie  raising  caged-beast  cries  in  execration  of  the  yoke  ? 
She  would  not  now  be  seeing  herself  as  hare,  serpent, 
tigress  !  The  hypothesis  was  reviewed  in  negatives  :  she 
had  barely  a  sense  of  softness,  just  a  single  little  heave  of 
the  bosom,  quivering  upward  and  leadenly  sinking,  when 
she  glanced  at  a  married  Diana  heartily  mated.  The 
regrets  of  the  youthful  for  a  life  sailing  away  under  medi- 
cal sentence  of  death  in  the  sad  eyes  of  relatives  resemble 
it.     She  could  have  loved.     Good-bye  to  that ! 

A  woman's  brutallest  tussle  with  the  world  was  upon 
her.  She  was  in  the  arena  of  the  savage  claws,  flung  there 
by  the  man  who  of  all  others  should  have  protected  her 
from  them.  And  what  had  she  done  to  deserve  it  ?  She 
listened  to  the  advocate  pleading  her  case  ;  she  primed  him 
to  admit  the  charges,  to  say  the  worst,  in  contempt  of  legal 

7 


98  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

prudence,  and  thereby  expose  her  transparent  honesty. 
The  very  things  awakening  a  mad  suspicion  proved  her 
innocence.  But  was  she  this  utterly  simple  person  ?  Oh, 
no !  She  was  the  Diana  of  the  pride  in  her  power  of  fenc- 
ing with  evil  —  by  no  means  of  the  order  of  those  ninny 
young  women  who  realize  the  popular  conception  of  the 
purely  innocent.  She  had  fenced  and  kept  her  guard.  Of 
this  it  was  her  angry  glory  to  have  the  knowledge.  But 
she  had  been  compelled  to  fence.  Such  are  men  in  the 
world  of  facts,  that  when  a  woman  steps  out  of  her  domes- 
tic tangle  to  assert,  because  it  is  a  tangle,  her  rights  to 
partial  independence,  they  sight  her  for  their  prey,  or  at 
least  they  complacently  suppose  her  accessible.  Wretched 
at  home,  a  woman  ought  to  bury  herself  in  her  wretchedness, 
else  may  she  be  assured  that  not  the  cleverest,  wariest 
guard  will  cover  her  character. 

Against  the  husband  her  cause  was  triumphant.  Against 
herself  she  decided  not  to  plead  it,  for  this  reason,  that  the 
preceding  Court,  which  was  the  public  and  only  positive 
one,  had  entirely  and  justly  exonerated  her.  But  the 
holding  of  her  hand  by  the  friend  half  a  minute  too  long 
for  friendship,  and  the  overfriendliness  of  looks,  letters, 
frequency  of  visits,  would  speak  within  her.  She  had  a 
darting  view  of  her  husband's  estimation  of  them  in  his 
present  mood.  She  quenched  it;  they  were  trifles,  things 
that  women  of  the  world  have  to  combat.  The  revelation 
to  a  fair-minded  young  woman  of  the  majority  of  men 
being  naught  other  than  men,  and  some  of  the  friendliest 
of  men  betraying  confidence  under  the  excuse  of  tempta- 
tion, is  one  of  the  shocks  to  simplicity  which  leave  her  the 
alternative  of  misanthropy  or  philosophy.  Diana  had  not 
the  heart  to  hate  her  kind,  so  she  resigned  herself  to  par- 
don, and  to  the  recognition  of  the  state  of  duel  between  the 
sexes  —  active  enough  in  her  sphere  of  society.  The  circle 
hummed  with  it ;  many  lived  for  it.  Could  she  pretend  to 
ignore  it  ?  Her  personal  experience  might  have  instigated 
a  less  clear  and  less  intrepid  nature  to  take  advantage  of 
the  opportunity  for  playing  the  popular  innocent,  who  runs 
about  with  astonished  eyes  to  find  herself  in  so  hunting  a 
world,  and  wins  general  compassion,  if  not  shelter  in  un- 
suspected and  unlicenced  places.     There  is  perpetually  the 


THE  CONFLICT   OF  THE  NIGHT  99 

inducement  to  act  the  hypocrite  before  the  hypocrite  world, 
unless  a  woman  submits  to  be  the  humbly  knitting  house- 
wife, unquestioniugly  worshipful  of  her  lord ;  for  the  world 
is  ever  gracious  to  an  hypocrisy  that  pays  homage  to  the 
mask  of  virtue  by  copying  it;  the  world  is  hostile  to  the 
face  of  an  innocence  not  conventionally  simpering  and 
quite  surprised;  the  world  prefers  decorum  to  honesty. 
"Let  me  be  myself,  whatever  the  martyrdom!  "  she  cried, 
in  that  j)hase  of  young  sensation  when,  to  the  blooming 
woman,  the  putting  on  of  a  mask  appears  to  wither  her 
and  reduce  her  to  the  show  she  parades.  Yet,  in  common 
with  her  sisterhood,  she  owned  she  had  worn  a  sort  of 
mask ;  the  world  demands  it  of  them  as  the  price  of  their 
station.  That  she  had  never  worn  it  consentingly,  was  the 
plea  for  now  casting  it  off  altogether,  showing  herself  as 
she  was,  accepting  martyrdom,  becoming  the  first  martyr 
of  the  modern  woman's  cause  —  a  grand  position  !  and  one 
imaginable  to  an  excited  mind  in  the  dark,  which  does  not 
conjure  a  critical  humour,  as  light  does,  to  correct  the 
feverish  sublimity.  She  was,  then,  this  martyr,  a  woman 
capable  of  telling  the  world  she  knew  it,  and  of  confessing 
that  she  had  behaved  in  disdain  of  its  rigider  rules,  accord- 
ing to  her  own  ideas  of  her  immunities.     0  brave  ! 

But  was  she  holding  the  position  by  flight  ?  It  involved 
the  challenge  of  consequences,  not  an  evasion  of  them. 

She  moaned  ;  her  mental  steam-wheel  stopped ;  fatigue 
brought  sleep. 

She  had  sensationally  led  her  rebellious  wits  to  the 
Crossways,  distilling  much  poison  from  thoughts  on  the 
way;  and  there,  for  the  luxury  of  a  still  seeming  indecision, 
she  sank  into  oblivion. 


100  DIANA  OP  THE  CROSSWAYS 


CHAPTER  XI 

RECOUNTS  THE  JOURNEY  IN  A  CHARIOT,  WITH  A  CERTAIN 
AMOUNT  OF  DIALOGUE,  AND  A  SMALL  INCIDENT  ON  THE 
ROAD 

In  the  morning  the  fight  was  over.  She  looked  at  the 
signpost  of  The  Crossways  whilst  dressing,  and  submitted 
to  follow,  obediently  as  a  puppet,  the  road  recommended 
by  friends,  though  a  voice  within,  that  she  took  for  the 
intimations  of  her  reason,  protested  that  they  were  wrong, 
that  they  were  judging  of  her  case  in  the  general,  and 
unwisely  —  disastrously  for  her. 

The  mistaking  of  her  desires  for  her  reason  was  peculiar 
to  her  situation, 

*^  So  I  suppose  I  shall  some  day  see  The  Crossways  again," 
she  said,  to  conceive  a  compensation  in  the  abandonment 
of  freedom.  The  night's  red  vision  of  martyrdom  was 
reserved  to  console  her  secretly,  among  the  unopened 
lockers  in  her  treasury  of  thoughts.  It  helped  to  sustain 
her ;  and  she  was  too  conscious  of  things  necessary  for  her 
sustainment  to  bring  it  to  the  light  of  day  and  examine  it. 
She  had  a  pitiful  bit  of  pleasure  in  the  gratification  she 
imparted  to  Dan  vers,  by  informing  her  that  the  journey 
of  the  day  was  backward  to  Copsley. 

"  If  I  may  venture  to  say  so,  ma'am,  I  am  very  glad,'* 
said  her  maid. 

"  You  must  be  prepared  for  the  questions  of  lawyers, 
Danvers." 

"Oh,  ma'am!  they'll  get  nothing  out  of  me,  and  their 
wigs  won't  frighten  me." 

"  It  is  usually  their  baldness  that  is  most  frightening,  my 
poor  Danvers." 

"  Nor  their  baldness,  ma'am,"  said  the  literal  maid ;  "  1 
never  cared  for  their  heads,  or  them.  I  've  been  in  a  Case 
before." 

"  Indeed ! "  exclaimed  her  mistress ;  and  she  had  a  chill. 

Danvers  mentioned  a  notorious  Case,  adding,  "  They  got 
nothing  out  of  me." 


THE  JOURNEY  IK  A  CHARIOT  101 

"  In  my  Case  you  will  please  to  speak  the  truth,"  said 
Diana,  and  beheld  in  the  looking-glass  the  primming  of  her 
maid's  mouth.     The  sight  shot  a  sting. 

"  Understand  that  there  is  to  be  no  hesitation  about  telling 
the  truth  of  what  you  know  of  me,"  said  Diana ;  and  the 
answer  was,  "  No,  ma'am." 

For  Danvers  could  remark  to  herself  that  she  knew  little, 
and  was  not  a  person  to  hesitate.  She  was  a  maid  of  the 
world,  with  the  quality  of  faithfulness,  by  nature,  to  a 
good  mistress. 

Eedworth's  further  difficulties  were  confined  to  the  hiring 
of  a  conveyance  for  the  travellers,  and  hot-water  bottles, 
together  with  a  postillion  not  addicted  to  drunkenness. 
He  procured  a  posting-chariot,  an  ancient  and  musty, 
of  a  late  autumnal  yellow  unrefreshed  by  paint ;  the  only 
bottles  to  be  had  were  Dutch  schiedam.  His  postillion, 
inspected  at  Storling,  carried  the  flag  of  habitual  inebriation 
on  his  nose,  and  he  deemed  it  advisable  to  ride  the  mare 
in  accompaniment  as  far  as  Riddlehurst,  notwithstanding 
the  postillion's  vows  upon  his  honour  that  he  was  no  drinker. 
The  emphasis,  to  a  gentleman  acquainted  with  his  country- 
men, was  not  reassuring.  He  had  hopes  of  enlisting  a 
trustier  fellow  at  Riddlehurst,  but  he  was  disappointed  ; 
and  while  debating  upon  what  to  do,  for  he  shrank  from 
leaving  two  women  to  the  conduct  of  that  inflamed  trough- 
snout,  Brisby,  despatched  to  Storling  by  an  afterthought 
of  Lady  Dunstane's,  rushed  out  of  the  Riddlehurst  inn 
taproom,  and  relieved  him  of  the  charge  of  the  mare.  He 
was  accommodated  with  a  seat  on  a  stool  in  the  chariot, 
"  My  triumphal  car,"  said  his  captive.  She  was  very 
amusing  about  her  postillion  ;  Danvers  had  to  beg  pardon 
for  laughing.  ''You  are  happy,"  observed  her  mistress. 
But  Redworth  laughed  too,  and  he  could  not  boast  of  any 
happiness  beyond  the  temporary  satisfaction,  nor  could 
she  who  sprang  the  laughter  boast  of  that  little.  She 
said  to  herself,  in  the  midst  of  the  hilarity,  "  Wherever 
I  go  now,  in  all  weathers,  I  am  perfectly  naked ! "  And 
remembering  her  readings  of  a  certain  wonderful  old  quarto 
book  in  her  father's  library,  by  an  eccentric  old  Scottish 
nobleman,  wherein  the  wearing  of  garments  and  sleeping 
in  houses  is  accused  as  the  cause  of  human  degeneracy,  she 


102  DIAKA   OF  THE   CKOSSWAYS 

took  a  forced  merry  stand  on  her  return  to  the  primitive 
healthful  state  of  man  and  woman,  and  affected  scorn 
of  our  modern  ways  of  dressing  and  thinking.  Whence 
it  came  that  she  had  some  of  her  wildest  seizures  of 
iridescent  humour.  Danvers  attributed  the  fun  to  her 
mistress's  gladness  in  not  having  pursued  her  bent  to  quit 
the  country.  E-edworth  saw  deeper,  and  was  nevertheless 
amazed  by  the  airy  hawk-poise  and  pounce-down  of  her 
wit,  as  she  ranged  high  and  low,  now  capriciously  gener- 
alizing, now  dropping  bolt  upon  things  of  passage  —  the 
postillion  jogging  from  rum  to  gin,  the  rustics  baconly 
agape,  the  horse-kneed  ostlers.  She  touched  them  to  the 
life  in  similes  and  phrases ;  and  next  she  was  aloft, 
derisively  philosophizing,  but  with  a  comic  afflatus  that 
dispersed  the  sharpness  of  her  irony  in  mocking  laughter. 
The  afternoon  refreshments  at  the  inn  of  the  county 
market-town,  and  the  English  idea  of  public  hospitality, 
as  to  manner  and  the  substance  provided  for  wayfarers, 
was  among  the  themes  she  made  memorable  to  him.  She 
spoke  of  everything  tolerantly,  just  naming  it  in  a  simple 
sentence,  that  fell  with  a  ring  and  chimed  :  their  host's 
ready  acquiescence  in  receiving  orders,  his  contemptuous 
disclaimer  of  stuff  he  did  not  keep,  his  flat  indifference  to 
the  sheep  he  sheared,  and  the  phantom  half-crown  flicker- 
ing in  one  eye  of  the  anticipatory  waiter;  the  pervading 
and  confounding  smell  of  stale  beer  over  all  the  apartments; 
the  prevalent  notion  of  bread,  butter,  tea,  milk,  sugar,  as 
matter  for  the  exercise  of  a  native  inventive  genius  —  these 
were  reviewed  in  quips  of  metaphor. 

"Come,  we  can  do  better  at  an  inn  or  two  known  to  me," 
said  E-edworth. 

"  Surely  this  is  the  best  that  can  be  done  for  us,  when  we 
strike  them  with  the  magic  wand  of  a  postillion?  "  said  she. 

"It  depends,  as  elsewhere,  on  the  individuals  enter- 
taining us." 

"  Yet  you  admit  that  your  railways  are  rapidly  *  polish- 
ing off'  the  individual." 

"They  will  spread  the  metropolitan  idea  of  comfort." 

"  I  fear  they  will  feed  us  on  nothing  but  that  big  word. 
It  booms  —  a  curfew  bell  —  for  every  poor  little  light  that 
we  would  read  by." 


THE  JOURNEY  IN  A  CHARIOT  103 

Seeing  their  beacon-nosed  postillion  preparing  to  mount 
and  failing  in  his  jump,  Red  worth  was  apprehensive,  and 
questioned  the  fellow  concerning  potation. 

"Lord,  sir,  they  call  me  half  a  horse,  but  I  can't  'bide 
water,"  was  the  reply,  with  the  assurance  that  he  had  not 
"taken  a  pailful." 

Habit  enabled  him  to  gain  his  seat. 

"  It  seems  to  us  unnecessary  to  heap  on  coal  when  the 
chimney  is  afire;  but  he  may  know  the  proper  course," 
Diana  said,  convulsing  Dan  vers;  and  there  was  discernibly 
to  Red  worth,  under  the  influence  of  her  phrases,  a  like- 
ness of  the  flaming  "half-horse,"  with  the  animals  all 
smoking  in  the  frost,  to  a  railway  engine.  "  Your  wrinkled 
centaur,"  she  named  the  man.  Of  course  he  had  to  play 
second  to  her,  and  not  unwillingly;  but  he  reflected  pass- 
ingly on  the  instinctive  push  of  her  rich  and  sparkling 
voluble  fancy  to  the  initiative,  which  women  do  not  like 
in  a  woman,  and  men  prefer  to  distantly  admire.  English 
women  and  men  feel  toward  the  quick-witted  of  their 
species  as  to  aliens,  having  the  demerits  of  aliens  —  wordi- 
ness, vanity,  obscurity,  shallowness,  an  empty  glitter,  the 
sin  of  posturing.  A  quick-witted  woman  exerting  her  wit 
is  both  a  foreigner  and  potentially  a  criminal.  She  is 
incandescent  to  a  breath  of  rumour.  It  accounted  for  her 
having  detractors ;  a  heavy  counterpoise  to  her  enthusiastic 
friends.  It  might  account  for  her  husband's  discontent  — 
the  reduction  of  him  to  a  state  of  mere  masculine  antago- 
nism. What  is  the  husband  of  a  vanward  woman?  He 
feels  himself  but  a  diminished  man.  The  English  husband 
of  a  voluble  woman  relapses  into  a  dreary  mute.  Ah,  for 
the  choice  of  places!  Redworth  would  have  yielded  her 
the  loquent  lead  for  the  smallest  of  the  privileges  due  to 
him  who  now  rejected  all,  except  the  public  scourging  of 
her.  The  conviction  was  in  his  mind  that  the  husband  of 
this  woman  sought  rather  to  punish  than  be  rid  of  her. 
But  a  part  of  his  own  emotion  went  to  form  the  judgement. 

Furthermore,  Lady  Dunstane's  allusion  to  her  "  enemies  " 
made  him  set  down  her  growing  crop  of  backbiters  to  the 
trick  she  had  of  ridiculing  things  English.  If  the  English 
do  it  themselves,  it  is  in  a  professionally  robust,  a  jocose, 
kindly  way,  always  with  a  glance  at  the  other  things,  great 


104  DIANA  OF  THJE   CROSSWAYS 

things,  they  excel  in;  and  it  is  done  to  have  the  credit  of 
doing  it.  They  are  keen  to  catch  an  inimical  tone ;  they 
will  find  occasion  to  chastise  the  presumptuous  individual, 
unless  it  be  the  leader  of  a  party,  therefore  a  power;  for 
they  respect  a  power.  Eedworth  knew  their  quaintnesses ; 
without  overlooking  them  he  winced  at  the  acid  of  an  irony 
that  seemed  to  spring  from  aversion,  and  regretted  it,  for 
her  sake.  He  had  to  recollect  that  she  was  in  a  sharp- 
strung,  mood,  bitterly  surexcited;  moreover  he  reminded 
himself  of  her  many  and  memorable  phrases  of  enthusiasm 
for  England  —  Shakespeareland,  as  she  would  sometimes 
perversely  term  it,  to  sink  the  country  in  the  poet.  English 
fortitude,  English  integrity,  the  English  disposition  to  do 
justice  to  dependents,  adolescent  English  ingenuousness, 
she  was  always  ready  to  laud.  Only  her  enthusiasm  re- 
quired rousing  by  circumstances ;  it  was  less  at  the  brim 
than  her  satire.  Hence  she  made  enemies  among  a  placable 
people. 

He  felt  that  he  could  have  helped  her  under  happier 
conditions.  The  beautiful  vision  she  had  been  on  the 
night  of  the  Irish  Ball  swept  before  him,  and  he  looked  at 
her,  smiling. 

"Why  do  you  smile?  "  she  said. 

"I  was  thinking  of  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith." 

*'Ah!  my  dear  compatriot  !  And  think,  too,  of  Lord 
Larrian." 

She  caught  her  breath.  Instead  of  recreation,  the 
names  brought  on  a  fit  of  sadness.  It  deepened;  she 
neither  smiled  nor  rattled  any  more.  She  gazed  across 
the  hedgeways  at  the  white  meadows  and  bare-twigged 
copses  showing  their  last  leaves  in  the  frost. 

"  I  remember  your  words :  ^  Observation  is  the  most 
enduring  of  the  pleasures  of  life  ;  '  and  so  I  have  found 
it,"  she  said.  There  was  a  brightness  along  her  under- 
eyelids  that  caused  him  to  look  away. 

The  expected  catastrophe  occurred  on  the  descent  of  a 
cutting  in  the  sand,  where  their  cordial  postillion  at  a  trot 
bumped  the  chariot  against  the  sturdy  wheels  of  a  waggon, 
which  sent  it  reclining  for  support  upon  a  beech-tree's  huge 
intertwisted  serpent  roots,  amid  strips  of  brown  bracken 
and  pendant  weeds,  while  he  exhibited  one  short  stump  of 


THE  JOURNEY  IN  A  CHARIOT  105 

leg,  all  boot,  in  air.  No  one  was  hurt.  Diana  disengaged 
herself  from  the  shoulder  of  Danvers,  and  mildly  said,  — 

"  That  reminds  me,  I  forgot  to  ask  why  we  came  in  a 
chariot." 

Kedworth  was  excited  on  her  behalf,  but  the  broken 
glass  had  done  no  damage,  nor  had  Danvers  fainted.  The 
remark  was  unintelligible  to  him,  apart  from  the  comfort- 
ing it  had  been  designed  to  give.  He  jumped  out,  and 
held  a  hand  for  them  to  do  the  same.  "  I  never  foresaw 
an  event  more  positively,"  said  he. 

"  And  it  was  nothing  but  a  back  view  that  inspired  you 
all  the  way,"  said  Diana. 

A  waggoner  held  the  horses,  another  assisted  Eedworth 
to  right  the  chariot.  The  postillion  had  hastily  recovered 
possession  of  his  official  seat,  that  he  might  as  soon  as 
possible  feel  himself  again  where  he  was  most  intelligent, 
and  was  gay  in  stupidity,  indifferent  to  what  happened 
behind  him.  Diana  heard  him  counselling  the  waggoner 
as  to  the  common  sense  of  meeting  small  accidents  with  a 
cheerful  soul. 

"  Lord  !  "  he  cried,  "  I  been  pitched  a  somerset  in  my 
time,  and  taken  up  for  dead,  and  that  did  n't  beat  me!  " 

Disasters  of  the  present  kind  could  hardly  affect  such  a 
veteran.  But  he  was  painfully  disconcerted  by  Redworth's 
determination  not  to  entrust  the  ladies  any  farther  to  his 
guidance.  Danvers  had  implored  for  permission  to  walk 
the  mile  to  the  town,  and  thence  take  a  fly  to  Copsley. 
Her  mistress  rather  sided  with  the  postillion,  who  begged 
them  to  spare  him  the  disgrace  of  riding  in  and  delivering 
a  box  at  the  Ked  Lion. 

"  What  '11  they  say?  And  they  know  Arthur  Dance  well 
there,"  he  groaned.  "What  !  Arthur!  chariotin'  a  box! 
And  me  a  better  man  to  his  work  now  than  I  been  for 
many  a  long  season,  fit  for  double  the  journey  !  A  bit  of 
a  shake  always  braces  me  up.  I  could  read  a  newspaper 
right  off,  small  print  and  all.  Come  along,  sir,  and  hand 
the  ladies  in." 

Danvers  vowed  her  thanks  to  Mr.  Redworth  for  refusing. 
They  walked  ahead;  the  postillion  communicated  his  mix- 
ture of  professional  and  human  feelings  to  the  waggoners, 
and  walked  his  horses  in  the  rear,  meditating  on  the  weak- 


106  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

heartedness  of  gentryfolk,  and  the  means  for  escaping 
being  chaffed  out  of  his  boots  at  the  Old  Ked  Lion,  where 
he  was  to  eat,  drink,  and  sleep  that  night.  Ladies  might 
be  fearsome  after  a  bit  of  a  shake ;  he  would  not  have  sup- 
posed it  of  a  gentleman.  He  jogged  himself  into  an  arith- 
metic of  the  number  of  nips  of  liquor  he  had  taken  to 
soothe  him  on  the  road,  in  spite  of  the  gentleman.  "For 
some  of  'em  are  sworn  enemies  of  poor  men,  as  yonder 
one,  ne'er  a  doubt." 

Diana  enjoyed  her  walk  beneath  the  lingering  brown-red 
of  the  frosty  November  sunset,  with  the  scent  of  sand- 
earth  strong  in  the  air. 

"I  had  to  hire  a  chariot  because  there  was  no  two-horse 
carriage,"  said  Kedworth,  "and  I  wished  to  reach  Copsley 
as  early  as  possible." 

She  replied,  smiling,  that  accidents  were  fated.  As  a 
certain  marriage  had  been!  The  comparison  forced  itself 
on  her  reflections. 

"But  this  is  quite  an  adventure,"  said  she,  reanimated 
by  the  brisker  flow  of  her  blood.  "  We  ought  really  to  be 
thankful  for  it,  in  days  when  nothing  happens." 

Eedworth  accused  her  of  getting  that  idea  from  the 
perusal  of  romances. 

"Yes,  our  lives  require  compression,  like  romances,  to 
be  interesting,  and  we  object  to  the  process,"  she  said. 
"  Real  happiness  is  a  state  of  dulness.  When  we  taste  it 
consciously  it  becomes  mortal  —  a  thing  of  the  Seasons. 
But  I  like  my  walk.  How  long  these  November  sunsets 
burn,  and  what  hues  they  have  !  There  is  a  scientific 
reason,  only  don't  tell  it  me.  Now  I  understand  why  you 
always  used  to  choose  your  holidays  in  November." 

She  thrilled  him  with  her  friendly  recollection  of  his 
customs. 

"As  to  happiness,  the  looking  forward  is  happiness,"  he 
remarked. 

"Oh,  the  looking  back  !  back!  "  she  cried. 

"Forward!  that  is  life." 

"And  backward,  death,  if  you  will;  and  still  it  is  hap- 
piness.    Death,  and  our  postillion  !  " 

"Ay;  I  wonder  why  the  fellow  hangs  to  the  rear,"  said 
Eedworth,  turning  about. 


BETWEEN  E:M]MA  AND  DIANA  107 

''It's  his  cunning  strategy,  poor  creature,  so  that  he 
may  be  thought  to  have  delivered  us  at  the  head  of  the 
town,  for  us  to  make  a  purchase  or  two,  if  we  go  to  the 
inn  on  foot,"  said  Diana.  "We'll  let  the  manoeuvre 
succeed." 

Eedworth  declared  that  she  had  a  head  for  everything, 
and  she  was  flattered  to  hear  him. 

So  passing  from  the  southern  into  the  western  road,  they 
saw  the  town-lights  beneath  an  umber  sky  burning  out 
sombrely  over  the  woods  of  Copsley,  and  entered  the  town, 
the  postillion  following. 


CHAPTER  XII 

BETWEEN   EMMA   AND    DIANA 

Diana  was  in  the  arms  of  her  friend  at  a  late  hour  of 
the  evening,  and  Danvers  breathed  the  amiable  atmosphere 
of  footmen  once  more,  professing  herself  perished.  This 
maid  of  the  world,  who  could  endure  hardships  and  loss 
of  society  for  the  mistress  to  whom  she  was  attached,  no 
sooner  saw  herself  surrounded  by  the  comforts  befitting 
her  station,  than  she  indulged  in  the  luxury  of  a  wailful 
dejectedness,  the  better  to  appreciate  them.  She  was 
unaffectedly  astonished  to  find  her  outcries  against  the  cold 
and  the  journeyings  to  and  fro  interpreted  as  a  serving- 
woman's  muffled  comments  on  her  mistress's  behaviour. 
Lady  Dunstane's  maid  Bartlett,  and  Mrs,  Bridges  the 
housekeeper,  and  Foster  the  butler,  contrived  to  let  her 
know  that  they  could  speak  an  if  they  would ;  and  they 
expressed  their  pity  of  her  to  assist  her  to  begin  the  speak- 
ing. She  bowed  in  acceptance  of  Foster's  offer  of  a  glass 
of  wine  after  supper,  but  treated  him  and  the  other 
two  immediately  as  though  they  had  been  interrogating 
bigwigs. 

"They  wormed  nothing  out  of  me,"  she  said  to  her  mis- 
tress at  night,  undressing  her.  "But  what  a  set  they  are! 
They  've  got  such  comfortable  places,  they  We  all  their  days 


108  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

aud  hours  for  talk  of  the  doings  of  their  superiors.  They 
read  the  vilest  of  those  town  papers,  and  they  put  their 
two  and  two  together  of  what  is  happening  in  and  about. 
And  not  one  of  the  footmen  thinks  of  staying,  because 
it 's  so  dull ;  and  they  and  the  maids  object  —  did  one  ever 
liear?  —  to  the  three  uppers  retiring,  when  they've  done 
dining,  to  the  private  room  to  dessert." 

"That  is  the  custom?  "  observed  her  mistress. 

"Foster  carries  the  decanter,  ma'am,  and  Mrs.  Bridges 
the  biscuits,  and  Bartlett  the  plate  of  fruit,  and  they 
march  out  in  order." 

"The  man  at  the  head  of  the  procession,  probably." 

"  Oh,  yes.  And  the  others,  though  they  have  everything 
except  the  wine  and  dessert,  don't  like  it.  When  I  was 
here  last  they  were  new,  and  had  n't  a  word  against  it. 
Now  they  say  it's  invidious!  Lady  Dunstane  will  be  left 
without  an  under-servant  at  Copsley  soon.  I  was  asked 
about  your  boxes,  ma'am,  and  the  moment  I  said  they  were 
at  Dover,  that  instant  all  three  peeped.  They  let  out  a 
mouse  to  me.     They  do  love  to  talk  !  " 

Her  mistress  could  have  added,  "  And  you  too,  my  good 
Danvers ! "  trustworthy  though  she  knew  the  creature  to 
be  in  the  main. 

"  Now  go,  and  be  sure  you  have  bedclothes  enough  before 
you  drop  asleep,"  she  said;  and  Danvers  directed  her  steps 
to  gossip  with  Bartlett. 

Diana  wrapped  herself  in  a  dressing-gown  Lady  Dunstane 
had  sent  her,  and  sat  by  the  fire,  thinking  of  the  powder 
of  tattle  stored  in  servants'  halls  to  explode  beneath  her: 
and  but  for  her  choice  of  roads  she  might  have  been  among 
strangers.  The  liking  of  strangers  best  is  a  curious  exem- 
plification of  innocence. 

"Yes,  I  was  in  a  muse,"  she  said,  raising  her  head  to 
Emma,  whom  she  expected  and  sat  armed  to  meet,  unac- 
countably iron-nerved.  "I  was  questioning  whether  I 
could  be  quite  as  blameless  as  I  fancy,  if  I  sit  and  shiver 
to  be  in  England.  You  will  tell  me  1  have  taken  the  right 
road.  I  doubt  it.  But  the  road  is  taken,  and  here  I  am. 
But  any  road  that  leads  me  to  you  is  homeward,  my  darl- 
ing ! "  She  tried  to  melt,  determining  to  be  at  least  open 
with  her. 


BETWEEN  El^IMA  AND  DIANA  106 

"I  have  not  praised  you  enough  for  coming,"  said 
Emma,  when  they  had  embraced  again. 

"Praise  a  little  your  truest  friend  of  women.'  Your 
letter  gave  the  tug.     I  might  have  resisted  it." 

"  He  came  straight  from  heaven  !  But,  cruel  Tony ! 
where  is  your  love?" 

"It  is  unequal  to  yours,  dear,  I  see.  I  could  have 
wrestled  with  anything  abstract  and  distant,  from  being 
certain —    But  here  I  am." 

"But,  my  own  dear  girl,  you  never  could  have  allowed 
this  infamous  charge  to  be  undefended?  " 

"I  think  so.  I've  an  odd  apathy  as  to  my  character; 
rather  like  death,  when  one  dreams  of  flying  the  soul. 
What  does  it  matter?  I  should  have  left  the  flies  and 
wasps  to  worry  a  corpse.  And  then  —  good-bye  gentility ! 
I  should  have  worked  for  my  bread.  I  had  thoughts  of 
America.  I  fancy  I  can  write;  and  Americans,  one  hears, 
are  gentle  to  women." 

"Ah,  Tony!  there's  the  looking  back.  And,  of  all 
women,  you  ! " 

"  Or  else,  dear  —  well,  perhaps  once  on  foreign  soil,  in  a 
different  air,  I  might  —  might  have  looked  back,  and  seen 
my  whole  self,  not  shattered,  as  I  feel  it  now,  and  come 
home  again  compassionate  to  the  poor  persecuted  animal 
to  defend  her.  Perhaps  that  was  what  I  was  running 
away  for.  I  fled  on  the  instinct,  often  a  good  thing  to 
trust." 

"I  saw  you  at  The  Crossways." 

"  I  remembered  I  had  the  dread  that  you  would,  though 
I  did  not  imagine  you  would  reach  me  so  swiftly.  My 
going  there  was  an  instinct,  too.  I  suppose  we  are  all 
instinct  when  we  have  the  world  at  our  heels.  Forgive 
me  if  I  generalize  without  any  longer  the  right  to  be 
included  in  the  common  human  sum.  *  Pariah  '  and 
*  taboo '  are  words  we  borrow  from  barbarous  tribes ;  they 
stick  to  me." 

"My  Tony,  you  look  as  bright  as  ever,  and  you  speak 
despairingly." 

"Call  me  enigma.     I  am  that  to  myself,  Emmy." 

"  You  are  not  quite  yourself  to  your  friend." 

"Since  the  blow  I  have  been  bewildered;  I  see  nothing 


110  DIANA  OF  THE   CKOSSWAYS 

upright.  It  came  on  me  suddenly ;  stunned  me.  A  bolt 
out  of  a  clear  sky,  as  they  say.  He  spared  me  a  scene. 
There  had  been  threats,  and  yet  the  sky  was  clear,  or 
seemed.  When  we  have  a  man  for  arbiter,  he  is  our 
sky." 

Emma  pressed  her  Tony's  unresponsive  hand,  feeling 
strangely  that  her  friend  ebbed  from  her. 

"Has  he  ...  to  mislead  him?"  she  said,  colouring  at 
the  breach  in  the  question. 

"Proofs?    He  has  the  proofs  he  supposes." 

"Not  to  justify  suspicion?  " 

"He  broke  open  my  desk  and  took  my  letters." 

"Horrible!  But  the  letters?"  Emma  shook  with  a 
nervous  revulsion. 

"You  might  read  them." 

"  Basest  of  men  !  That  is  the  unpardonable  cowardice  ! " 
exclaimed  Emma. 

"The  world  will  read  them,  dear,"  said  Diana,  and 
struck  herself  to  ice. 

She  broke  from  the  bitter  frigidity  in  fury.  "  They  are 
letters  —  none  very  long  —  sometimes  two  short  sentences 
—  he  wrote  at  any  spare  moment.  On  my  honour,  as  a 
woman,  I  feel  for  him  most.  The  letters  —  I  would  bear 
any  accusation  rather  than  that  exposure.  Letters  of  a 
man  of  his  age  to  a  young  woman  he  rates  too  highly! 
The  world  reads  them.  Do  you  hear  it  saying  it  could 
have  excused  her  for  that  fiddle-faddle  with  a  younger  — 
a  young  lover?  And  had  I  thought  of  a  lover!  ...  I 
had  no  thought  of  loving  or  being  loved.  I  confess  I  was 
flattered.  To  you,  Emma,  I  will  confess.  .  .  .  You  see 
the  public  ridicule !  —  and  half  his  age,  he  and  I  would 
have  appeared  a  romantic  couple !  Confess,  I  said.  Well, 
dear,  the  stake  is  lighted  for  a  trial  of  its  effect  on  me. 
It  is  this :  he  was  never  a  dishonourable  friend ;  but  men 
appear  to  be  capable  of  friendship  with  women  only  for  as 
long  as  we  keep  out  of  pulling  distance  of  that  line  where 
friendship  ceases.  They  may  step  on  it;  we  must  hold 
back  a  league.  I  have  learnt  it.  You  will  judge  whether 
he  disrespects  me.  As  for  him,  he  is  a  man;  at  his  worst, 
not  one  of  the  worst;  at  his  best,  better  than  very  many. 
There,  now,  Emma,  you  have  me  stripped  and  burning; 


BETWEEN   EI^OIA  AND  DIANA  111 

there  is  my  full  confession.  Except  for  this  —  yes,  one 
thing  further  —  that  I  do  rage  at  the  ridicule,  and  could 
choose,  but  for  you,  to  have  given  the  world  cause  to  revile 
me,  or  think  me  romantic.  Something  or  somebody  to 
suffer  for  would  really  be  agreeable.  It  is  a  singular  fact, 
I  have  not  known  what  this  love  is,  that  they  talk  about. 
And  behold  me  marched  into  Smithfield!  —  society's  here- 
tic, if  you  please.     I  must  own  I  think  it  hard." 

Emma  chafed  her  cold  hand  softly. 

"It  is  hard;  I  understand  it,"  she  murmured.  "And  is 
your  Sunday  visit  to  us  in  the  list  of  offences?  " 

"An  item." 

"You  gave  me  a  happy  day." 

"Then  it  counts  for  me  in  heaven." 

"He  set  spies  on  you?  " 

"So  we  may  presume." 

Emma  went  through  a  sphere  of  tenuious  reflections  in 
a  flash. 

"He  will  rue  it.  Perhaps  now  ...  he  may  now  be 
regretting  his  wretched  frenzy.  And  Tony  could  pardon; 
she  has  the  power  of  pardoning  in  her  heart." 

"  Oh !  certainly,  dear.  But  tell  me  why  it  is  you  speak 
to-night  rather  unlike  the  sedate,  philosophical  Emma;  in 
a  tone  —  well,  tolerably  sentimental  ?  " 

"I  am  unaware  of  it,"  said  Emma,  who  could  have  re- 
torted with  a  like  reproach.  "I  am  anxious,  I  will  not 
say  at  present  for  your  happiness,  for  your  peace ;  and  I 
have  a  hope  that  possibly  a  timely  word  from  some  friend 
—  Lukin  or  another  —  might  induce  him  to  consider." 

"To  pardon  me,  do  you  mean?"  cried  Diana,  flushing 
sternly. 

"Not  pardon.     Suppose  a  case  of  faults  on  both  sides." 

"You  address  a  faulty  person,  my  dear.  But  do  you 
know  that  you  are  hinting  at  a  reconcilement?  " 

"Might  it  not  be?" 

"Open  your  eyes  to  what  it  involves.  I  trust  I  can 
pardon.  Let  him  go  his  ways,  do  his  darkest,  or  repent. 
But  return  to  the  roof  of  the  *  basest  of  men,'  who  was 
guilty  of  *  the  unpardonable  cowardice'?  You  expect  me 
to  be  superhuman.  When  I  consent  to  that,  I  shall  be  out 
of  my  woman's  skin,  which  he  has  branded.     Go  back  to 


112  DIANA  OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

him  !  "  She  was  taken  with  a  shudder  of  head  and  limbs. 
"No;  I  really  have  the  power  of  pardoning,  and  I  am 
bound  to ;  for  among  my  debts  to  him,  this  present  exemp- 
tion, that  is  like  liberty  dragging  a  chain,  or,  say,  an 
escaped  felon  wearing  his  manacles,  should  count.  I  am 
sensible  of  my  obligation.  The  price  I  pay  for  it  is  an 
immovable  patch  —  attractive  to  male  idiots,  I  have  heard, 
and  a  mark  of  scorn  to  females.  Between  the  two  the 
remainder  of  my  days  will  be  lively.  *  Out,  out,  damned 
spot!'  But  it  will  not.  And  not  on  the  hand  —  on  the 
forehead!  We  '11  talk  of  it  no  longer.  I  have  sent  a  note, 
with  an  enclosure,  to  my  lawyers.  I  sell  The  Crossways, 
if  I  have  the  married  woman's  right  to  any  scrap  of  prop- 
erty, for  money  to  scatter  fees." 

*'My  purse,  dear  Tony!"  exclaimed  Emma.  "My 
house!  You  will  stay  with  me?  Why  do  you  shake  your 
head?  With  me  you  are  safe."  She  spied  at  the  shadows 
in  her  friend's  face.  "Ever  since  your  marriage,  Tony, 
you  have  been  strange  in  your  trick  of  refusing  to  stay 
with  me.  And  you  and  I  made  our  friendship  the  pledge 
of  a  belief  in  eternity !  We  vowed  it.  Come,  I  do  talk 
sentimentally,  but  my  heart  is  in  it.  I  beg  you  —  all  the 
reasons  are  with  me  —  to  make  my  house  your  home.  You 
will.     You  know  I  am  rather  lonely." 

Diana  struggled  to  keep  her  resolution  from  being  broken 
by  tenderness.  And  doubtless  poor  Sir  Lukin  had  learnt 
his  lesson;  still,  her  defensive  instincts  could  never  quite 
slumber  under  his  roof;  not  because  of  any  further  fear 
that  they  would  have  to  be  summoned;  it  was  chiefly  owing 
to  the  consequences  of  his  treacherous  foolishness.  Eor 
this  half -home  with  her  friend  thenceforward  denied  to 
her,  she  had  accepted  a  protector,  called  husband  —  rashly, 
past  credence,  in  the  retrospect;  but  it  had  been  her  pro- 
pelling motive;  and  the  loathings  roused  by  her  marriage 
helped  to  sicken  her  at  the  idea  of  a  lengthened  stay  where 
she  had  suffered  the  shock  precipitating  her  to  an  act  of 
insanity. 

"I  do  not  forget  you  were  an  heiress,  Emmy,  and  I  will 
come  to  you  if  I  need  money  to  keep  my  head  up.  As  for 
staying,  two  reasons  are  against  it.  If  I  am  to  fight  my 
battle,  I  must  be  seen;  I  must  go  about  —  wherever  I  am 


BETWEEN   EMMA  AND  DIANA  113 

:^iiceived.  So  my  field  is  London.  That  is  obvious.  And 
I  shall  rest  better  in  a  house  where  my  story  is  not 
known." 

Two  or  three  questions  ensued.  Diana  had  to  fortify 
her  fictitious  objection  by  alluding  to  her  maid's  prattle 
of  the  household  below;  and  she  excused  the  hapless, 
overfed,  idle  people  of  those  regions. 

To  Emma  it  seemed  a  not  unnatural  sensitiveness.  She 
came  to  a  settled  resolve  in  her  thoughts,  as  she  said, 
"They  want  a  change.     London  is  their  element." 

Feeling  that  she  deceived  this  true  heart,  however  lightly 
and  necessarily,  Diana  warmed  to  her,  forgiving  her  at 
last  for  having  netted  and  dragged  her  back  to  front  the 
enemy;  an  imposition  of  horrors,  of  which  the  scene  and 
the  travelling  with  Eedworth,  the  talking  of  her  case  with 
her  most  intimate  friend  as  well,  had  been  a  distempering 
foretaste. 

They  stood  up  and  kissed,  parting  for  the  night. 

An  odd  world,  where  for  the  sin  we  have  not  participated 
in  we  must  fib  and  continue  fibbing,  she  reflected.  She 
did  not  entirely  cheat  her  clearer  mind,  for  she  perceived 
that  her  step  in  flight  had  been  urged  both  by  a  weak 
despondency  and  a  blind  desperation;  also  that  the  world 
of  a  fluid  civilization  is  perforce  artificial.  But  her  mind 
was  in  the  background  of  her  fevered  senses,  and  when 
she  looked  in  the  glass  and  mused  on  uttering  the  word, 
"Liar!"  to  the  lovely  image,  her  senses  were  refreshed, 
her  mind  somewhat  relieved,  the  face  appeared  so  sover- 
eignly defiant  of  abasement. 

Thus  did  a  nature  distraught  by  pain  obtain  some  short 
lull  of  repose.  Thus,  moreover,  by  closely  reading  her- 
self, whom  she  scourged  to  excess  that  she  might  in  justice 
be  comforted,  she  gathered  an  increasing  knowledge  of  our 
human  constitution,  and  stored  matter  for  the  brain. 


114  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

CHAPTER  XIII 

TOUCHING   THE   FIRST    DAYS    OF    HER   PROBATION 

The  result  of  her  sleeping  was,  that  Diana's  humour, 
locked  up  over-night,  insisted  on  an  excursion,  as  she  lay 
with  half-buried  head  and  open  eyelids,  thinking  of  the 
iirm  of  lawyers  she  had  to  see;  and  to  whom,  and  to  the 
legal  profession  generally,  she  would  be,  under  outward 
courtesies,  nothing  other  than  "the  woman  Warwick." 
She  pursued  the  woman  Warwick  unmercifully  through  a 
series  of  interviews  with  her  decorous  and  crudely-minded 
defenders;  accurately  perusing  them  behind  their  senior 
staidness.  Her  scorching  sensitiveness  sharpened  her 
intelligence  in  regard  to  the  estimate  of  discarded  wives 
entertained  by  men  of  business  and  plain  men  of  the  world, 
and  she  drove  the  woman  Warwick  down  their  ranks, 
amazed  by  the  vision  of  a  puppet  so  unlike  to  herself  in 
reality,  though  identical  in  situation.  That  woman,  recit- 
ing her  side  of  the  case,  gained  a  gradual  resemblance  to 
Danvers;  she  spoke  primly;  perpetually  the  creature  aired 
her  handkerchief;  she  was  bent  on  softening  those  sugar- 
loaves,  the  hard  business-men  applying  to  her  for  facts. 
Facts  were  treated  as  unworthy  of  her;  mere  stuff  of  the 
dustheap,  mutton-bones,  old  shoes;  she  swam  above  them 
in  a  cocoon  of  her  spinning,  sylphidine,  unseizable;  and 
between  perplexing  and  mollifying  the  slaves  of  facts,  she 
saw  them  at  their  heels,  a  tearful  fry,  abjectly  imitative 
of  her  melodramatic  performances.  The  spectacle  was 
presented  of  a  band  of  legal  gentlemen  vociferating  mightily 
for  swords  and  the  onset,  like  the  Austrian  empress's 
Magyars,  to  vindicate  her  just  and  holy  cause.  Our  Law- 
courts  failing,  they  threatened  Parliament,  and  for  a  last 
resort,  the  country  !  We  are  not  going  to  be  the  woman 
Warwick  without  a  stir,  my  brethren. 

Emma,  an  early  riser  that  morning,  for  the  purpose  of 
a  private  consultation  with  Mr.  Redworth,  found  her  lying 
placidly  wakeful,  to  judge  by  appearances. 

"You  have  not  slept,  my  dear  child?" 


THE  FIRST   DAYS   OF   HER   PROBATION  115 

"Perfectly,"  said  Diana,  giving  her  hand  and  offering 
the  lips.  "  I  'm  only  having  a  warm  morning  bath  in  bed," 
she  added,  in  explanation  of  a  chill  moisture  that  the  touch 
of  her  exposed  skin  betrayed;  for  whatever  the  fun  of  the 
woman  Warwick,  there  had  been  sympathetic  feminine 
horrors  in  the  frame  of  the  sentient  woman. 

Emma  fancied  she  kissed  a  quiet  sufferer.  A  few  re- 
marks very  soon  set  her  wildly  laughing.  Both  were 
laughing  when  Danvers  entered  the  room,  rather  guilty, 
being  late;  and  the  sight  of  the  prim-visaged  maid  she 
had  been  driving  among  the  lawyers  kindled  Diana's  comic 
imagination  to  such  a  pitch  that  she  ran  riot  in  drolleries, 
carrying  her  friend  headlong  on  the  tide. 

"I  have  not  laughed  so  much  since  you  were  married," 
said  Emma. 

"  Nor  I,  dear ;  —  proving  that  the  bar  to  it  was  the 
ceremony,"  said  Diana. 

She  promised  to  remain  at  Copsley  three  days.  "  Then 
for  the  campaign  in  Mr.  Redworth's  metropolis.  I  won- 
der whether  I  may  ask  him  to  get  me  lodgings :  a  sitting- 
room  and  two  bedrooms.  The  Crossways  has  a  board  up 
for  letting.  I  should  prefer  to  be  my  own  tenant;  only  it 
would  give  me  a  hundred  pounds  more  to  get  a  substitute's 
money.  I  should  like  to  be  at  work  writing  instantly. 
Ink  is  my  opium,  and  the  pen  my  nigger,  and  he  must  dig 
up  gold  for  me.  It  is  written.  Danvers,  you  can  make 
ready  to  dress  me  when  I  ring." 

Emma  helped  the  beautiful  woman  to  her  dressing-gown 
and  the  step  from  her  bed.  She  had  her  thoughts,  and 
went  down  to  Redworth  at  the  breakfast-table,  marvelling 
that  any  husband  other  than  a  madman  could  cast  such  a 
jowpl  away.  The  material  loveliness  eclipses  intellectual 
qualities  in  such  reflections. 

"He  must  be  mad,"  she  said,  compelled  to  disburden 
herself  in  a  congenial  atmosphere;  which,  however,  she 
infrigidated  by  her  overflow  of  exclamatory  wonderment 
—  a  curtain  that  shook  voluminous  folds,  luring  Redworth 
to  dreams  of  the  treasure  forfeited.  He  became  rigidly 
practical. 

"Provision  will  have  to  be  made  for  her.  Lukin  must 
see  Mr.  Warwick.     She  will  do  wisely  to  stay  with  friends 


116  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

in  town,  mix  in  company.  Women  are  the  best  allies  foi 
such  cases.     Who  are  her  solicitors?" 

"They  are  mine:  Braddock,  Thorpe,  and  Simnel." 

"  A  good  firm.  She  is  in  safe  hands  with  them.  I  dare 
say  they  may  come  to  an  arrangement." 

"I  should  wish  it.     She  will  never  consent." 

Redworth  shrugged.  A  woman's  "never"  fell  far  short 
of  outstripping  the  sturdy  pedestrian  Time,  to  his  mind. 

Diana  saw  him  drive  off  to  catch  the  coach  in  the  valley, 
regulated  to  meet  the  train,  and  much  though  she  liked 
him,  she  was  not  sorry  that  he  had  gone.  She  felt  the 
better  clad  for  it.  She  would  have  rejoiced  to  witness  the 
departure  on  wings  of  all  her  friends,  except  Emma,  to 
whom  her  coldness  overnight  had  bound  her  anew  warmly 
in  contrition.  And  yet  her  friends  were  well-beloved  by 
her;  but  her  emotions  were  distraught. 

Emma  told  her  that  Mr.  Redworth  had  undertaken  to 
hire  a  suite  of  convenient  rooms,  and  to  these  she  looked 
forward,  the  nest  among  strangers,  where  she  could  begin 
to  write,  earning  bread:  an  idea  that,  with  the  pride  of 
independence,  conjured  the  pleasant  morning  smell  of  a 
bakery  about  her. 

She  passed  three  peaceable  days  at  Copsley,  at  war  only 
with  the  luxury  of  the  house.  On  the  fourth,  a  letter  to 
Lady  Dunstane  from  Redworth  gave  the  address  of  the 
best  lodgings  he  could  find,  and  Diana  started  for  London. 

She  bad  during  a  couple  of  weeks,  besides  the  first  fresh 
exercising  of  her  pen,  as  well  as  the  severe  gratification  of 
economy,  a  savage  exultation  in  passing  through  the  streets 
on  foot  and  unknown.  Save  for  the  plunges  into  the  office 
of  her  solicitors,  she  could  seem  to  herself  a  woman  who 
had  never  submitted  to  the  yoke.  What  a  pleasure  it  was, 
after  finishing  a  number  of  pages,  to  start  Eastward  toward 
the  lawyer-regions,  full  of  imaginary  cropping  incidents, 
and  from  that  churchyard  Westward,  against  smoky  sun- 
sets, or  in  welcome  fogs,  an  atom  of  the  crowd!  She  had 
an  affection  for  the  crowd.  They  clothed  her.  She 
laughed  at  the  gloomy  forebodings  of  Danvers  concerning 
the  perils  environing  ladies  in  the  streets  after  dark  alone. 
The  lights  in  the  streets  after  dark,  and  the  quick  running 
of  her  blood,  combined  to  strike  sparks  of  fancy  and  in- 


THE  FIRST  DAYS   OF  HER   PROBATION  117 

Spirit  the  tusk  of  composition  at  night.  This  new,  strange, 
solitary  life,  cut  off  from  her  adulatory  society,  both  %y 
the  shock  that  made  the  abyss  and  by  the  utter  foreigu- 
ness,  threw  her  in  upon  her  natural  forces,  recasting  her, 
and  thinning  away  her  memory  of  her  past  days,  except- 
ing girlhood,  into  the  remote.  She  lived  with  her  c^irl- 
hood  as  with  a  simple  little  sister.  They  were  two  in 
one,  and  she  corrected  the  dreams  of  the  younger,  protected 
and  counselled  her  very  sagely,  advising  her  to  love  Truth 
and  look  always  to  Reality  for  her  refreshment.  She  was 
ready  to  say,  that  no  habitable  spot  on  our  planet  was 
healthier  and  pleasanter  than  London.  As  to  the  perils 
haunting  the  head  of  Danvers,  her  experiences  assured  he" 
of  a  perfect  immunity  from  them;  and  the  maligned  thor- 
oughfares of  a  great  city,  she  was  ready  to  affirm,  con- 
trasted favourably  with  certain  hospitable  halls. 

The  long-suffering  Fates  permitted  her  for  a  term  to 
enjoy  the  generous  delusion.  Subsequently  a  sweet  sur- 
prise alleviated  the  shock  she  had  sustained.  Emma 
Dunstane's  carriage  was  at  her  door,  and  Emma  entered 
her  sitting-room,  to  tell  her  of  having  hired  a  house  in  the 
neighbourhood,  looking  on  the  park.  She  begged  to  have 
her  for  guest,  sorrowfully  anticipating  the  refusal.  At 
least  they  were  to  be  near  one  another. 

"You  really  like  this  life  in  lodgings?"  asked  Emma, 
to  whom  the  stiff  furniture  and  narrow  apartments  were 
a  dreariness,  the  miserably  small  lire  of  the  sitting-room 
an  aspect  of  cheerless  winter. 

"I  do,"  said  Diana;  *'yes,"  she  added  with  some  reserve 
and  smiled  at  her  damped  enthusiasm,  "I  can  eat  when  I 
like,  walk,  work  — and  I  am  working!  My  legs  and  my 
pen  demand  it.  Let  me  be  independent !  Besides,  I  begin 
to  learn  something  of  the  bigger  world  outside  the  one  I 
know,  and  I  crush  my  mincing  tastes.  In  return  for  that 
1  get  a  sense  of  strength  I  had  not  when  I  was  a  drawinc^' 
room  exotic.  Much  is  repulsive.  But  I  am  taken  with^'a 
passion  for  reality." 

They  spoke  of  the  lawyers,  and  the  calculated  period  of 
the  trial;  of  the  husband  too,  and  his  inciting  belief  in 
the  falseness  of  his  wife.  "That  is  his  excuse,"  Diana 
said,  her  closed  mouth  meditatively  dimpling  the  corners 


118  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

over  thoughts  of  his  grounds  for  fury.  He  had  them, 
though  none  for  the  incriminating  charge.  The  Sphinx 
mouth  of  the  married  woman  at  war  and  at  bay  must  be 
left  unriddled.  She  and  the  law  differed  in  their  inter- 
pretation of  the  dues  of  wedlock. 

But  matters  referring  to  her  case  were  secondary  with 
Diana  beside  the  importance  of  her  storing  impressions. 
Her  mind  required  to  hunger  for  something,  and  this 
Keality  which  frequently  she  was  forced  to  loathe,  she 
forced  herself  proudly  to  accept,  despite  her  youthful n ess. 
Her  philosophy  swallowed  it  in  the  lump,  as  the  great 
serpent  his  meal  5  she  hoped  to  digest  it  sleeping  like- 
wise. Her  visits  of  curiosity  to  the  Law  Courts,  where 
she  stood  spying  and  listening  behind  a  veil,  gave  her  a 
great  deal  of  tough  substance  to  digest.  There  she  watched 
the  process  of  the  tortures  to  be  applied  to  herself,  and 
hardened  her  senses  for  the  ordeal.  She  saw  there  the 
ribbed  and  shanked  old  skeleton  world  on  which  our  fair 
fleshly  is  moulded.  After  all,  your  Fool's  Paradise  is  not 
a  garden  to  grow  in.  Charon's  ferry-boat  is  not  thicker 
with  phantoms.  They  do  not  live  in  mind  or  soul.  Chiefly 
women  people  it:  a  certain  class  of  limp  men;  women  for 
the  most  part:  they  are  sown  there.  And  put  their  garden 
under  the  magnifying  glass  of  intimacy,  what  do  we  be- 
hold? A  world  not  better  than  the  world  it  curtains,  only 
foolisher. 

Her  conversations  with  Lady  Dunstane  brought  her  at 
last  to  the  point  of  her  damped  enthusiasm.  She  related 
an  incident  or  two  occurring  in  her  career  of  independence, 
and  they  discussed  our  state  of  civilization  plainly  and 
gravely,  save  for  the  laughing  peals  her  phrases  occasion- 
ally provoked;  as  when  she  named  the  intruders  and  dis- 
turbers of  solitarily-faring  ladies,  "Cupid's  footpads." 
Her  humour  was  created  to  swim  on  waters  where  a 
prescribed  and  cultivated  prudery  should  pretend  to  be 
drowning. 

"  I  was  getting  an  exalted  idea  of  English  gentlemen, 
Emmy.  *  Kich  and  rare  were  the  gems  she  wore.'  I  was 
ready  to  vow  that  one  might  traverse  the  larger  island 
similarly  respected.  I  praised  their  chivalry.  I  thought 
it  a  privilege  to  live  in  such  a  land.     I  cannot  describe  to 


THE  FIRST  DAYS   OF   HER   PROBATION  119 

you  how  delightful  it  was  to  me  to  walk  out  and  home 
generally  protected.  I  might  have  been  seriously  annoyed 
but  that  one  of  the  clerks  —  *  articled,'  he  called  himself  — 
of  our  lawyers  happened  to  be  by.  He  offered  to  guard  me, 
and  was  amusing  with  his  modest  tiptoe  air.  No,  I  trust  to 
the  English  common  man  more  than  ever.  He  is  a  man  of 
honour.  I  am  convinced  he  is  matchless  in  any  other 
country,  except  Ireland.  The  English  gentleman  trades  on 
his  reputation." 

He  was  condemned  by  an  af&icted  delicacy,  the  sharpest 
of  critical  tribunals. 

Emma  bade  her  not  to  be  too  sweeping  from  a  bad  example. 

"  It  is  not  a  single  one,''  said  Diana.  *'  What  vexes  me 
and  frets  me  is,  that  I  must  be  a  prisoner,  or  allow  Danvers 
to  mount  guard.  And  I  can't  see  the  end  of  it.  And 
Danvers  is  no  magician.  She  seems  to  know  her  country- 
men, though.  She  warded  one  of  them  off,  by  saying  to  me  : 
'This  is  the  crossing,  my  lady.''     He  fled." 

Lady  Danstane  affixed  the  popular  title  to  the  latter  kind 
of  gentleman.  She  was  irritated  on  her  friend's  behalf,  and 
against  the  worrying  of  her  sisterhood,  thinking  in  her 
heart,  nevertheless,  that  the  passing  of  a  face  and  figure 
like  Diana's  might  inspire  honourable  emotions,  pitiable  for 
being  hapless. 

"  If  you  were  with  me,  dear,  you  would  have  none  of  these 
annoyances,"  she  said,  pleading  forlornly. 

Diana  smiled  to  herself.  "No !  I  should  relapse  into 
softness.  This  life  exactly  suits  my  present  temper.  My 
landlady  is  respectful  and  attentive  ;  the  little  housemaid 
is  a  willing  slave  ;  Danvers  does  not  despise  them  pugna- 
ciously ;  they  make  a  home  for  me,  and  I  am  learning  daily. 
Do  you  know,  the  less  ignorant  I  become,  the  more  cod- 
siderate  I  am  for  the  ignorance  of  others  —  I  ]ove  them  for 
it."  She  squeezed  Emma's  hand  with  more  meaning  than 
her  friend  apprehended.  "  So  I  win  my  advantage  from 
the  trifles  I  have  to  endure.  They  are  really  trifles,  and  I 
should  once  have  thought  them  mountains  ! " 

For  the  moment  Diana  stipulated  that  she  might  not  have 
to  encounter  friends  or  others  at  Lady  Dunstane's  dinner- 
table,  and  the  season  not  being  favourable  to  those  gatherings 
planned  by  Lady  Dunstane  in  her  project  of  winning  sup- 


120  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

porters,  there  was  a  respite,  during  which  Sir  Lukin  worked 
manfully  at  his  three  Clubs  to  vindicate  Diana's  name  from 
the  hummers  and  hawers,  gaining  half  a  dozen  hot  adherents, 
and  a  body  of  lukewarm,  sufficiently  stirred  to  be  desirous 
to  see  the  lady.  He  worked  with  true  champion  zeal, 
although  an  interview  granted  him  by  the  husband  settled 
his  opinion  as  to  any  possibility  of  the  two  ever  coming  to 
terms.  Also  it  struck  him  that  if  he  by  misadventure  had 
been  a  woman  and  the  wife  of  such  a  fellow,  by  Jove  !  .  .  . 
—  his  apostrophe  to  the  father  of  the  gods  of  pagandom 
signifying  the  amount  of  matter  Warwick  would  have  had 
reason  to  complain  of  in  earnest.  By  ricochet  his  military 
mind  rebounded  from  his  knowledge  of  himself  to  an  ardent 
faith  in  Mrs.  Warwick's  innocence ;  for,  as  there  was  no 
resemblance  between  them,  there  must,  he  deduced,  be  a 
difference  in  their  capacity  for  enduring  the  perpetual 
company  of  a  prig,  a  stick,  a  petrified  poser.  Moreover, 
the  novel  act  of  advocacy,  and  the  nature  of  the  advocacy, 
had  effect  on  him.  And  then  he  recalled  the  scene  in  the 
winter  beech-woods,  and  Diana's  wild-deer  eyes  ;  her  perfect 
generosity  to  a  traitor  and  fool.  How  could  he  have 
doubted  her?  Glimpses  of  the  corrupting  cause  for  it 
partly  penetrated  his  density  :  a  conqueror  of  ladies,  in  mid 
career,  doubts  them  all.  Of  course  he  had  meant  no  harm, 
nothing  worse  than  some  pretty  philandering  with  the  love- 
liest woman  of  her  time.  And,  by  Jove !  it  was  worth  the 
rebuff  to  behold  the  Beauty  in  her  wrath. 

The  reflections  of  Lothario,  however  much  tending  tardily 
to  do  justice  to  a  particular  lady,  cannot  terminate  whole- 
somely. But  he  became  a  gallant  partisan.  His  portrayal 
of  Mr.  Warwick  to  his  wife  and  his  friends  was  fine  cari- 
cature. "  The  fellow  had  his  hand  up  at  my  first  word  — 
stood  like  a  sentinel  under  inspection.  *  Understand,  Sir 
Lukin,  that  I  receive  you  simply  as  an  acquaintance.  As 
an  intermediary,  permit  me  to  state  that  you  are  taking 
superfluous  trouble.  The  case  must  proceed.  It  is  final. 
She  is  at  liberty,  in  the  meantime,  to  draw  on  my  bankers 
for  the  provision  she  may  need,  at  the  rate  of  five  hundred 
pounds  per  annum.'  He  spoke  of  ^  the  lady  now  bearing  my 
name.'  He  was  within  an  inch  of  saying  ^  dishonouring.'  I 
swear  I  heard  the  *  dis,'  and  he  caught  himself  up.    He  ^  again 


THE   FIRST   DAYS   OF   UER    PROBATION  121 

declined  any  attempt  towards  reconciliation.'  It  could 
'  only  be  founded  on  evasion  of  the  truth  to  be  made  patent 
on  the  day  of  trial.'  Half  his  talk  was  lawyers'  lingo. 
The  fellow's  teeth  looked  like  frost.  If  Lot's  wife  had  a 
brother,  his  name's  Warwick.  How  Diana  Merion,  who 
could  have  had  the  pick  of  the  best  of  us,  ever  came  to 
marry  a  fellow  like  that,  passes  my  comprehension,  queer 
creatures  as  women  are  !  He  can  ride ;  that 's  about  all  he 
can  do.  I  told  him  Mrs.  Warwick  had  no  thought  of  recon- 
ciliation. '  Then,  Sir  Lukin,  you  will  perceive  that  we 
have  no  standpoint  for  a  discussion.'  I  told  him  the  point 
was,  for  a  man  of  honour  not  to  drag  his  wife  before  the 
public,  as  he  had  no  case  to  stand  on  —  less  than  nothing. 
You  should  have  seen  the  fellow's  face.  He  shot  a  sneer 
up  to  his  eyelids,  and  flung  his  head  back.  So  I  said, 
^  Good  day.'  He  marches  me  to  the  door,  '  with  his  compli- 
ments to  Lady  Dunstane.'  I  could  have  floored  him  for 
that.  Bless  my  soul,  what  fellows  the  world  is  made  of, 
when  here  's  a  man,  calling  himself  a  gentleman,  who,  just 
because  he  gets  in  a  rage  with  his  wife  for  one  thing  or 
another  —  and  past  all  competition  the  handsomest  woman 
of  her  day,  and  the  cleverest,  the  nicest,  the  best  of  the 
whole  boiling  —  has  her  out  for  a  public  horsewhipping, 
and  sets  all  the  idiots  of  the  kingdom  against  her !  I  tried 
to  reason  with  him.  He  made  as  if  he  were  going  to  sleep 
standing." 

Sir  Lukin  gratified  Lady  Dunstane  by  his  honest  cham- 
pionship of  Diana.  And  now,  in  his  altered  mood  (the 
thrice  indebted  rogue  was  just  cloudily  conscious  of  a  desire 
to  propitiate  his  dear  wife  by  serving  her  friend),  he  began 
a  crusade  against  the  scandal-newspapers,  going  with  an 
Irish  military  comrade  straight  to  the  editorial  offices,  and 
leaving  his  card  and  a  warning  that  the  chastisement  for 
print  of  the  name  of  the  lady  in  their  columns  would  be 
personal  and  condign.  Captain  Carew  Mahony,  albeit  un- 
acquainted with  Mrs.  Warwick,  had  espoused  her  cause. 
She  was  a  woman,  she  was  an  Irishwoman,  she  was  a  beauti- 
ful woman.  She  had,  therefore,  three  positive  claims  on 
him  as  a  soldier  and  a  man.  Other  Irish  gentlemen,  ani- 
mated by  the  same  swelling  degrees,  were  awaking  to  the 
intimation  that  they  might  be  wanted.     Some  words  were 


122  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

dropped  here  and  there  by  General  Lord  Larrian :  lie  re- 
gretted his  age  and  infirmities.  A  goodly  regiment  for  a 
bodyguard  might  have  been  selected  to  protect  her  steps  in 
the  public  streets,  when  it  was  bruited  that  the  General  had 
sent  her  a  present  of  his  great  Newfoundland  dog,  Leander, 
to  attend  on  her  and  impose  a  required  respect.  But  as  it 
chanced  that  her  address  was  unknown  to  the  volunteer 
constabulary,  they  had  to  assuage  their  ardour  by  thinking 
the  dog  luckier  than  they. 

The  report  of  the  dog  was  a  fact.  He  arrived  one  morn- 
ing at  Diana's  lodgings,  with  a  soldier  to  lead  him,  and  a 
card  to  introduce :  the  Hercules  of  dogs,  a  very  ideal  of  the 
species,  toweringly  big,  benevolent,  reputed  a  rescuer  of 
lives,  disdainful  of  dog-fighting,  devoted  to  his  guardian's 
office,  with  a  majestic  paw  to  give  and  the  noblest  satisfac- 
tion in  receiving  caresses  ever  expressed  by  mortal  male 
enfolded  about  the  head,  kissed,  patted,  hugged,  snuggled, 
informed  that  he  was  his  new  mistress's  one  love  and 
darling. 

She  despatched  a  thrilling  note  of  thanks  to  Lord  Larrian, 
sure  of  her  touch  upon  an  Irish  heart. 

The  dog  Leander  soon  responded  to  the  attachment  of  a 
mistress  enamoured  of  him.  "He  is  my  husband,"  she  said 
to  Emma,  and  started  a  tear  in  the  eyes  of  her  smiling 
friend;  "he  promises  to  trust  me,  and  never  to  have  the 
law  of  me,  and  to  love  my  friends  as  his  own  ;  so  we  are 
certain  to  agree."  In  rain,  snow,  sunshine,  through  the 
parks  and  the  streets,  he  was  the  shadow  of  Diana,  com- 
manding, on  the  whole,  apart  from  some  desperate  attempts 
to  make  him  serve  as  introducer,  a  civilized  behaviour  in  the 
legions  of  Cupid's  footpads.  But  he  helped,  innocently 
enough,  to  create  an  enemy. 


DIANA   BEFORE  THE   WORLD  123 


CHAPTER  XIV 

«rVlNG     GLIMPSES     OF     DIANA     UNDER    HER    CLOUD     BEFORE 
THE    WORLD    AND    OF    HER    FURTHER   APPRENTICESHIP 

As  the  day  of  her  trial  became  more  closely  calculable, 
O^aua^s  anticipated  alarms  receded  with  the  deadening  of 
hf^v  heart  to  meet  the  shock.  She  fancied  she  had  put  on 
p^ool-armour,  unconscious  that  it  was  the  turning  of  the 
inward  flutterer  to  steel  which  supplied  her  cuirass  and 
shield.  The  necessity  to  brave  society,  m  the  character  of 
honest  Defendant,  caused  but  a  momentary  twitch  of  the 
nerves.  Her  heart  beat  regularly,  like  a  serviceable  clock ; 
none  of  her  faculties  abandoned  her  save  songfulness,  and 
none  belied  her,  excepting  a  disposition  to  tartness  almost 
venomous  in  the  sarcastic  shafts  she  let  fly  at  friends  inter- 
ceding with  Mr.  Warwick  to  spare  his  wife,  when  she  had 
determined  to  be  tried.  A  strange  fit  of  childishness  over- 
3ame  her  powers  of  thinking,  and  was  betrayed  in  her 
manner  of  speaking,  though  to  herself  her  dwindled  humour 
allowed  her  to  appear  the  towering  Britomart.  She  pouted 
contemptuously  on  hearing  that  a  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  (a 
remotely  recollected  figure)  had  besought  Mr.  Warwick  for 
an  interview,  and  gained  it,  by  stratagem,  "  to  bring  the 
man  to  his  senses : "  but  an  ultra-Irishman  did  not  com- 
promise her  battle-front,  as  the  busybody  supplications  of  a 
personal  friend  like  Mr.  Redworth  did  ;  and  that  the  latter, 
without  consulting  her,  should  be  "  one  of  the  plaintive  crew 
whining  about  the  heels  of  the  Plaintiff  for  a  mercy  she  dis- 
dained and  rejected  "  was  bitter  to  her  taste. 

"  He  does  not  see  that  unless  I  go  through  the  fire  there 
is  no  justification  for  this  wretched  character  of  mine  ! " 
she  exclaimed.  Truce,  treaty,  withdrawal,  signified  pub- 
licly pardon,  not  exoneration  by  any  means  ;  and  now  that 
she  was  in  armour  she  had  no  dread  of  the  public.  So  she 
said.  Redworth's  being  then  engaged  upon  the  canvass  of 
a  borough,  added  to  the  absurdity  of  his  meddling  with  the 
dilemmas  of  a  woman.  "  Dear  me,  Emma !  tliink  of  step- 
ping aside  from  the  parliamentary  road  to  entreat  a  husband 


124  DIAKA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

to  relent,  and  arrange  the  domestic  alliance  of  a  contrary 
couple !  Quixotry  is  agreeable  reading,  a  silly  perform- 
ance." Lady  Dunstane  pleaded  his  friendship.  She  had 
to  quit  the  field  where  such  darts  were  showering. 

The  first  dinner-party  was  aristocratic,  easy  to  encounter. 
Lord  and  Lady  Crane,  Lady  Pennon,  Lord  and  Lady 
Esquart,  Lord  Larrian,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Montvert  of  Halford 
Manor,  Lady  Singleby,  Sir  Walter  Capperston :  friends, 
admirers  of  Diana ;  patrons,  in  the  phrase  of  the  time,  of 
her  father,  were  the  guests.  Lady  Pennon  expected  to  be 
amused,  and  was  gratified,  for  Diana  had  only  to  open  her 
mouth  to  set  the  great  lady  laughing.  She  petitioned  to 
have  Mrs.  Warwick  at  her  table  that  day  week,  because 
the  marquis  was  dying  to  make  her  acquaintance,  and 
begged  to  have  all  her  sayings  repeated  to  him  ;  vowed  she 
must  be  salt  in  the  desert.  "  And  remember,  I  back  you 
through  thick  and  thin,''  said  Lady  Pennon.  To  which 
Diana  replied:  "If  I  am  salt  in  the  desert,  you  are  the 
spring;"  and  the  old  lady  protested  she  must  put  that 
down  for  her  book.  The  witty  Mrs.  Warwick,  of  whom 
wit  was  expected,  had  many  incitements  to  be  guilty  of 
cheap  wit ;  and  the  beautiful  Mrs.  Warwick,  being  able  to 
pass  anything  she  uttered,  gave  good  and  bad  alike,  under 
the  impulsion  to  give  out  something,  that  the  stripped  and 
shivering  Mrs.  Warwick  might  find  a  cover  in  applause. 
She  discovered  the  social  uses  of  cheap  wit  ;  she  laid 
ambushes  for  anecdotes,  a  telling  form  of  it  among  a  people 
of  no  conversational  interlocution,  especially  in  the  circles 
depending  for  dialogue  upon  perpetual  fresh  supplies  of 
scandal ;  which  have  plentiful  crops,  yet  not  sufficient. 
The  old  dinner  and  supper  tables  at  The  Cross wa3-s 
furnished  her  with  an  abundant  store ;  and  recollection 
failing,  she  invented.  Irish  anecdotes  are  always  popular 
in  England,  as  promoting,  besides  the  wholesome  shake  of 
the  sides,  a  kindly  sense  of  superiority.  Anecdotes  also 
are  portable,  unlike  the  lightning  flash,  which  will  not  go 
into  the  pocket;  they  can  be  carried  home,  they  are  dis- 
bursable  at  other  tables.  These  were  Diana's  weapons. 
She  was  perforce  the  actress  of  her  part.  In  happier  times, 
when  light  of  heart  and  natural,  her  vogue  had  not  been  so 
enrapturing.     Doubtless  Cleopatra  in  her  simple  Egyptian 


DIANA  BEFORE  THE  WORLD  125 

unifoFin  would  hardly  have  won  such  plaudits  as  her  stress 
of  barbaric  Oriental  splendours  evoked  for  her  on  the  swan 
and  serpent  Nile-barge  —  not  from  posterity  at  least.  It  is 
a  terrible  decree,  that  all  must  act  who  would  prevail ;  and 
the  more  extended  the  audience,  the  greater  need  for  the 
mask  and  buskin. 

From  Lady  Pennon's  table  Diana  passed  to  Lady  Crane's, 
Lady  Esquart's,  Lady  Singleby's,  the  Duchess  of  Raby's, 
warmly  clad  in  the  admiration  she  excited.  She  appeared 
at  Princess  Therese  Paryli's  first  ball  of  the  season,  and 
had  her  circle,  not  of  worshippers  only.  She  did  not  dance. 
The  princess,  a  fair  Austrian,  benevolent  to  her  sisterhood, 
an  admirer  of  Diana's  contrasting  complexion,  would  have 
had  her  dance  once  in  a  quadrille  of  her  forming,  but 
yielded  to  the  mute  expression  of  the  refusal.  Wherever 
Mrs.  Warwick  went,  her  arts  of  charming  were  addressed 
to  the  women.  Men  may  be  counted  on  for  falling  bowled 
over  by  a  handsome  face  and  pointed  tongue ;  women 
require  some  wooing  from  their  ensphered  and  charioted 
sister,  particularly  if  she  is  clouded ;  and  old  women  — 
excellent  buttresses  —  must  be  suavely  courted.  Now,  to 
woo  the  swimming  matron  and  court  the  settled  dowager, 
she  had  to  win  forgiveness  for  her  beauty  ;  and  this  was 
done,  easily  done,  by  forbearing  to  angle  with  it  in  the 
press  of  nibblers.  They  ranged  about  her,  individually 
unnoticed.  Seeming  unaware  of  its  effect  where  it  kindled, 
she  smote  a  number  of  musical  female  chords,  compassion 
among  them.  A  general  grave  affability  of  her  eyes  and 
smiles  was  taken  for  quiet  pleasure  in  the  scene.  Her  fitful 
intentness  of  look  when  conversing  with  the  older  ladies  told 
of  the  mind  within  at  work  upon  what  they  said,  and  she 
was  careful  that  plain  dialogue  should  make  her  compre- 
hensible to  them.  Nature  taught  her  these  arts,  through 
which  her  wit  became  extolled  entirely  on  the  strength  of 
her  reputation,  and  her  beauty  did  her  service  by  never 
taking  aim  abroad.  They  are  the  woman's  arts  of  self- 
defence,  as  legitimately  and  honourably  hers  as  the  manful 
use  of  the  fists  with  a  coarser  sex.  If  it  had  not  been 
nature  that  taught  her  the  practice  of  them  in  extremity, 
the  sagacious  dowagers  would  have  seen  brazenness  rather 
than  innocence  —  or  an  excusable  indiscretion  —  in  the  part 


126  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

she  was  performing.  They  are  not  lightly  duped  by  one 
of  their  sex.  Few  tasks  are  more  difficult  than  for  a  young 
woman  under  a  cloud  to  hoodwink  old  women  of  the  world. 
They  are  the  prey  of  financiers ;  but  Time  has  presented 
them  a  magic  ancient  glass  to  scan  their  sex  in. 

At  Princess  Paryli's  Ball  two  young  men  of  singular 
elegance  were  observed  by  Diana,  little  though  she  con- 
centered her  attention  on  any  figures  of  the  groups.  She 
had  the  woman's  faculty  (transiently  bestowed  by  perfervid 
jealousy  upon  men)  of  distinguishing  minutely  in  the  calm- 
est of  indifferent  glances.  She  could  see  without  looking  ; 
and  when  her  eyes  were  wide  they  had  not  to  dwell  to 
be  detective.  It  did  not  escape  her  that  the  Englishman 
of  the  two  hurried  for  the  chance  of  an  introduction,  nor 
that  he  suddenly,  after  putting  a  question  to  a  man  beside 
him,  retired.  She  spoke  of  them  to  Emma  as  they  drove 
home.  "The  princess's  partner  in  the  first  quadrille  .  .  . 
Hungarian,  I  suppose  ?  He  was  like  a  Tartar  modelled  by 
a  Greek :  supple  as  the  Scythian's  bow,  braced  as  the 
string  !  He  lias  the  air  of  a  born  horseman,  and  valses  per- 
fectly. I  won't  say  he  was  handsomer  than  a  young 
Englishman  there,  but  he  had  the  advantage  of  soldierly 
training.  How  different  is  that  quick  springy  figure  from 
our  young  men's  lounging  style  !  It  comes  of  military 
exercise  and  discipline." 

"  That  was  Count  Jochany,  a  cousin  of  the  princess,  and 
a  cavalry  officer,"  said  Emma.  "  You  don't  know  the  other  ? 
I  am  sure  the  one  you  mean  must  be  Percy  Dacier." 

His  retiring  was  explained :  the  Hon.  Percy  Dacier  was 
the  nephew  of  Lord  Dannisburgh,  often  extolled  to  her  as 
the  promising  youngster  of  his  day,  with  the  reserve  that 
he  wasted  his  youth  :  for  the  young  gentleman  was  decorous 
and  studious;  ambitious,  according  to  report;  a  politician 
taking  to  politics  much  too  seriously  and  exclusively  to 
suit  his  uncle's  pattern  for  the  early  period  of  life.  Uncle 
and  nephew  went  their  separate  ways,  rarely  meeting, 
though  their  exchange  of  esteem  was  cordial. 

Thinking  over  his  abrupt  retirement  from  the  crowded 
semicircle,  Diana  felt  her  position  pinch  her,  she  knew  not 
why. 

Lady  Dunstane  was  as  indefatigable  by  day  as  by  night 


DIANA  BEFORE  THE  WOKLD  127 

in  the  business  of  acting  goddess  to  her  beloved  Tony, 
whom  she  assured  that  the  service,  instead  of  exhausting, 
gave  her  such  healthfulness  as  she  had  imagined  herself 
to  have  lost  for  ever.  The  word  was  passed,  and  invita- 
tions poured  in  to  choice  conversational  breakfasts,  private 
afternoon  concerts,  all  the  humming  season's  assemblies. 
Mr.  Warwick's  treatment  of  his  wife  was  taken  by  implica- 
tion for  lunatic  ;  wherever  she  was  heard  or  seen,  he  had 
no  case  ;  a  jury  of  some  hundreds  of  both  sexes,  ready  to 
be  sworn,  pronounced  against  him.  Only  the  personal 
enemies  of  the  lord  in  the  suit  presumed  to  doubt,  and  they 
exercised  the  discretion  of  a  minority. 

But  there  is  an  upper  middle  class  below  the  aristocratic, 
boasting  an  aristocracy  of  morals,  and  eminently  persuasive 
of  public  opinion,  if  not  commanding  it.  Previous  to  the 
relaxation,  by  amendment,  of  a  certain  legal  process,  this 
class  was  held  to  represent  the  austerity  of  the  country. 
At  present  a  relaxed  austerity  is  represented ;  and  still  the 
bulk  of  the  members  are  of  fair  repute,  though  not  quite 
on  the  level  of  their  pretensions.  They  were  then,  while 
more  sharply  divided  from  the  titular  superiors  they  are 
socially  absorbing,  very  powerful  to  brand  a  woman's  char- 
acter, whatever  her  rank  might  be ;  having  innumerable 
agencies  and  avenues  for  that  high  purpose,  to  say  nothing 
of  the  printing-press.  Lady  Dunstane's  anxiety  to  draw 
them  over  to  the  cause  of  her  friend  set  her  thinking  of  the 
influential  Mrs.  Cramborne  Wathin,  with  whom  she  was 
distantly  connected ;  the  wife  of  a  potent  serjeant-at-law 
fast  mounting  to  the  Bench  and  knighthood  ;  the  centre  of 
a  circle,  and  not  strangely  that,  despite  her  deficiency  in 
the  arts  and  graces,  for  she  had  wealth  and  a  cook,  a  hus- 
band proud  of  his  wine-cellar,  and  the  ambition  to  rule  ;  all 
the  rewards,  together  with  the  expectations,  of  the  vir- 
tuous. She  was  a  lady  of  incisive  features  bound  in  stale 
parchment.  Complexion  she  had  none,  but  she  had  spot- 
lessness  of  skin,  and  sons  and  daughters  just  resembling 
her,  like  cheaper  editions  of  a  precious  quarto  of  a  per- 
ished type.  You  discerned  the  imitation  of  the  type,  you 
acknowledged  the  inferior  compositor.  Mr.  Cramborne 
Wathin  was  by  birth  of  a  grade  beneath  his  wife ;  he 
sprang  (behind  a  curtain  of  horror)  from  tradesmen.     The 


128  DIANA   OF   THE   CROSSWAYS 

Bench  was  in  designation  for  him  to  wash  out  the  stain, 
but  his  children  suffered  in  large  hands  and  feet,  short  legs, 
excess  of  bone,  prominences  misplaced.  Their  mother 
inspired  them  carefully  with  the  religion  she  opposed  to 
the  pretensions  of  a  nobler  blood,  while  instilling  into  them 
that  the  blood  they  drew  from  her  was  territorial,  far  above 
the  vulgar.  Her  appearance  and  her  principles  fitted  her 
to  stand  for  the  Puritan  rich  of  the  period,  emerging  by 
the  aid  of  an  extending  wealth  into  luxurious  worldliness, 
and  retaining  the  maxims  of  their  forefathers  for  the  dis- 
cipline of  the  poor  and  erring. 

Lady  Dunstane  called  on  her,  ostensibly  to  let  her  know 
she  had  taken  a  house  in  town  for  the  season,  and  in  the 
course  of  the  chat  Mrs.  Cramborne  Wathin  was  invited  to 
dinner.  "  You  will  meet  my  dear  friend,  Mrs.  Warwick," 
she  said,  and  the  reply  was  :  "  Oh,  I  have  heard  of  her." 

The  formal  consultation  with  Mr.  Cramborne  Wathin 
ended  in  an  agreement  to  accept  Lady  Dunstane's  kind 
invitation. 

Considering  her  husband's  plenitude  of  old  legal  anec- 
dotes, and  her  own  diligent  perusal  of  the  funny  publica- 
tions of  the  day,  that  she  might  be  on  the  level  of  the  wits 
and  celebrities  she  entertained,  Mrs.  Cramborne  Wathin 
had  a  right  to  expect  the  leading  share  in  the  conversation 
to  which  she  was  accustomed.  Every  honour  was  paid  to 
them  ;  they  met  aristocracy  in  the  persons  of  Lord  Larrian, 
of  Lady  Rockden,  Colonel  Purlby,  the  Pettigrews,  but 
neither  of  them  held  the  table  for  a  moment ;  the  topics 
flew,  and  were  no  sooner  up  than  down  ;  they  were  unable 
to  get  a  shot.  They  had  to  eat  in  silence,  occasionally 
grinning,  because  a  woman  labouring  under  a  stigma  Avould 
rattle-rattle,  as  if  the  laughter  of  the  company  were  her 
due,  and  decency  beneath  her  notice.  Some  one  alluded  to 
a  dog  of  Mrs.  Warwick's,  whereupon  she  trips  out  a  story 
of  her  dog's  amazing  intelligence. 

"And  pray,"  said  Mrs.  Cramborne  Wathin  across  the 
table,  merely  to  slip  in  a  word,  "  what  is  the  name  of  this 
wonderful  dog  ?  " 

"  His  name  is  Leander,"  said  Diana. 

"  Oh,  Leander.  I  don't  think  I  hear  myself  calling  to  a 
dog  in  a  name  of  three  syllables.     Two  at  the  most." 


DIANA   BEFORE  THE  WORLD  129 

"  No,  SO  I  call  Hero !  if  I  want  him  to  come  immediately,*' 
said  Diana,  and  the  gentlemen,  to  Mrs.  Cramborne  Wathin's 
astonishment,  acclaimed  it.  Mr.  Kedworth,  at  her  elbow, 
explained  the  point,  to  her  disgust. 

That  was  Diana's  offence. 

If  it  should  seem  a  small  one,  let  it  be  remembered  that 
a  snub  was  intended,  and  was  foiled  ;  and  foiled  with  an 
apparent  simplicity,  enough  to  exasperate,  had  there  been 
no  laughter  of  men  to  back  the  countering  stroke.  A 
woman  under  a  cloud,  she  talked,  pushed  to  shine ;  she 
would  be  heard,  would  be  applauded.  Her  chronicler  must 
likewise  admit  the  error  of  her  giving  way  to  a  petty  senti- 
ment of  antagonism  on  first  beholding  Mrs.  Cramborne 
Wathin,  before  whom  she  at  once  resolved  to  be  herself, 
for  a  holiday,  instead  of  acting  demurely  to  conciliate. 
Probably  it  was  an  antagonism  of  race,  the  shrinking  of 
the  skin  from  the  burr.  But  when  Tremendous  Powers  are 
invoked,  we  should  treat  any  simple  revulsion  of  our  blood 
as  a  vice.  The  Gods  of  this  world's  contests  demand  it  of 
us,  in  relation  to  them,  that  the  mind,  and  not  the  instincts, 
shall  be  at  work.  Otherwise  the  course  of  a  prudent  policy 
is  never  to  invoke  them,  but  avoid. 

The  upper  class  was  gained  by  her  intrepidity,  her  charm, 
and  her  elsewhere  offending  wit,  however  the  case  might 
go.  It  is  chivalrous,  but  not,  alas,  inflammable  in  support 
of  innocence.  The  class  below  it  is  governed  in  estimates 
of  character  by  accepted  patterns  of  conduct ;  yet  where 
innocence  under  persecution  is  believed  to  exist,  the  mem- 
bers animated  by  that  belief  can  be  enthusiastic.  Enthu- 
siasm is  a  heaven-sent  steeplechaser,  and  takes  a  flying 
leap  of  the  ordinary  barriers ;  it  is  more  intrusive  than 
chivalry,  and  has  a  passion  to  communicate  its  ardour. 
Two  letters  from  stranger  ladies  reached  Diana,  through 
her  lawyers  and  Lady  Dunstane.  Anonymous  letters,  not 
so  welcome,  being  male  effusions,  arrived  at  her  lodgings, 
one  of  them  comical  almost  over  the  verge  to  pathos  in  its 
termination  :  "  To  me  you  will  ever  be  the  Goddess  Diana 
—  my  faith  in  woman !  " 

He  was  unacquainted  with  her  ! 

She  had  not  the  heart  to  think  the  writers  donkeys. 
How  they  obtained  her  address  was  a  puzzle ;  they  stole 

9 


^ 


130  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

in  to  comfort  her  slightly.  They  attached  her  to  her 
position  of  Defendant  by  the  thought  of  what  would  have 
been  the  idea  of  her  character  if  she  had  flown — a  re- 
flection emanating  from  inexperience  of  the  resources  of 
sentimentalists. 

If  she  had  flown  !     She  was  borne  along  by  the  tide  like 
a  butterfly  that  a  fish  may  gobble  unless  a  friendly  hand 
shall  intervene.     And  could  it  in  nature  ?     She  was  past 
expectation  of  release.     The  attempt  to  imagine  living  with 
any  warmth  of  blood  in  her  vindicated  character,  for  the 
sake  of  zealous  friends,  consigned  her  to  a  cold  and  empty 
house  upon  a  foreign  earth.     She  had  to  set  her  mind  upon 
the  mysterious  enshrouded  Twelve,  with  whom  the  verdict 
would  soon  be  hanging,  that  she  might  prompt  her  human 
combativeness  to  desire  the  vindication  at  such  a  price  as 
she  would  have  to  pay  for  it.   When  Emma  Dunstane  spoke 
to  her  of  the   certainty  of  triumphing,  she   suggested  a 
possible  dissentient  among  the  fateful  Twelve,  merely  to 
escape  the  drumming  sound  of  that  hollow  big  word.     The 
irreverent  imp  of  her  humour  came  to  her  relief  by  calling 
forth  the  Twelve,  in  the  tone  of  the  clerk  of  the  Court, 
and  they  answered  to  their  names  of  trades  and  crafts  after 
the  manner  of  Titania's  elves,  and  were  questioned  as  to 
their  fitness,  by  education,  habits,  enlightenment,  to  pro- 
nounce decisively  upon  the  case  in  dispute,  the  case  being 
plainly  stated.     They  replied,  that  the  long  habit  of  deal- 
ing with  scales  enabled  them  to  weigh  the  value  of  evidence 
the  most  delicate.     Moreover,  they  were  Englishmen,  and 
anything  short  of  downright  bullet  facts  went  to  favour 
the  woman.     For  thus  we  right  the  balance  of  legal  in- 
justice toward  the  sex :  we  conveniently  wink,  ma'am.     A 
rough,  old-fashioned  way  for  us !     Is  it  a  Breach  of  Prom- 
ise ?  —  She  may  reckon  on  her  damages  :  we  have  daughters 
of  our  own.     Is  it  a  suit  for  Divorce  ?  —  Well,  we  have 
wives  of  our  own,  and  we  can  lash,  or  we  can  spare  ;  that 's 
as  it  may  be ;  but  we  '11  keep  the  couple  tied,  let  'em  hate 
as  they  like,  if  they  can't  furnish  porkbutchers'  reasons  for 
sundering;    because   the   man   makes   the   money   in   this 
country.  —  My  goodness !  what  a  funny  people,  sir  !  —  It 's 
our  way  of  holding  the  balance,  ma'am.  —  But  would  it  not 
be  better  to  rectify  the  law  and  the  social  system,  dear  sir  ? 


DIANA   BEFORE  THE  WORLD  13l 

—  Why,  ma'am,  we  find  it  comfortabler  to  take  cases  as 
they  come,  in  the  style  of  our  fathers.  —  But  don't  you  see, 
my  good  man,  that  you  are  offering  scapegoats  for  the  comfort 
of  the  majority  ?  —  Well,  ma'am,  there  always  were  scape- 
goats, and  always  will  be  ;  we  find  it  comes  round  pretty 
square  in  the  end. 

"  And  I  may  be  the  scapegoat,  Emmy  !  It  is  perfectly 
possible.  The  grocer,  the  porkbutcher,  drysalter,  stationer, 
tea-merchant,  et  caetera  —  they  sit  on  me.  I  have  studied 
the  faces  of  the  juries,  and  Mr.  Braddock  tells  me  of  their 
composition.     And  he  admits  that  they  do  justice  roughly 

—  a  rough  and  tumble  country  !  to  quote  him  —  though  he 
says  they  are  honest  in  intention." 

"  More  shame  to  the  man  who  drags  you  before  them  — 
if  he  persists  ! "  Emma  rejoined. 

"  He  will.  I  know  him.  I  would  not  have  him  draw 
back  now,"  said  Diana,  catching  her  breath.  ^'  And,  dear- 
est, do  not  abuse  him ;  for  if  you  do,  you  set  me  imagining 
guiltiness.  Oh,  heaven  !  —  suppose  me  publicly  pardoned  ! 
No,  I  have  kinder  feelings  when  we  stand  opposed.  It  is 
odd,  and  rather  frets  my  conscience,  to  think  of  the  little 
resentment  I  feel.  Hardly  any  !  He  has  not  cause  to  like 
his  wife.  I  can  own  it,  and  I  am  sorry  for  him,  heartily. 
No  two  have  ever  come  together  so  naturally  antagonistic 
as  we  two.  We  walked  a  dozen  steps  in  stupefied  union, 
and  hit  upon  crossways.  From  that  moment  it  was  tug  and 
tug;  he  me,  I  him.  By  resisting,  I  made  him  a  tyrant; 
and  he,  by  insisting,  made  me  a  rebel.  And  he  was  the 
maddest  of  tyrants  —  a  weak  one.  My  dear,  he  was  also 
a  double-dealer.  Or,  no,  perhaps  not  in  design.  He  was 
moved  at  one  time  by  his  interests ;  at  another  by  his  idea 
of  his  honour.  He  took  what  I  could  get  for  him,  and 
then  turned  and  drubbed  me  for  getting  it.'' 

''This  is  the  creature  you  try  to  excuse!"  exclaimed 
indignant  Emma. 

"  Yes,  because  —  but  fancy  all  the  smart  things  I  said 
being  called  my  '  sallies  ! ' —  can  a  woman  live  with  it  ?  — 
because  I  behaved  ...  I  despised  him  too  much,  and  I 
showed  it.  He  is  not  a  contemptible  man  before  the  world ; 
he  is  merely  a  very  narrow  one  under  close  inspection.  T 
could  not  —  or  did  not  —  conceal  my  feeling.     I  showed  it 


132  DIANA   OF   THE  CROSS  WAYS 

not  only  to  him,  to  my  friend.  Husband  grew  to  mean  to 
me  stifler,  lung-contractor,  iron  mask,  inquisitor,  everything 
anti-natural.  He  suffered  under  my  '  sallies  ' :  and  it  was 
the  worse  for  him  when  he  did  not  perceive  their  drift.  He 
is  an  upright  man  ;  I  have  not  seen  marked  meanness.  One 
might  build  up  a  respectable  figure  in  negatives.  I  could 
add  a  row  of  noughts  to  the  single  number  he  cherishes, 
enough  to  make  a  millionnaire  of  him  ;  but  strike  away  the 
first,  the  rest  are  wind.  Which  signifies,  that  if  you  do  not 
take  his  estimate  of  himself,  you  will  think  little  of  his 
negative  virtues.  He  is  not  eminently,  that  is  to  say,  not 
saliently,  selfish  ;  not  rancorous,  not  obtrusive  —  ta-ta-ta-ta. 
But  dull  !  —  dull  as  a  woollen  nightcap  over  eyes  and  ears 
and  mouth.  Oh !  an  executioner's  black  cap  to  me.  Dull, 
and  suddenly  staring  awake  to  the  idea  of  his  honour.  I 
*  renderecj '  him  ridiculous  —  I  had  caught  a  trick  of  '  using 
men's  phrases.'  Dearest,  now  that  the  day  of  trial  draws 
nigh  —  you  have  never  questioned  me,  and  it  was  like  you 
to  spare  me  pain  —  but  now  I  can  speak  of  Lim  and  myself." 
Diana  dropped  her  voice.  Here  was  another  confession. 
The  proximity  of  the  trial  acted  like  fire  on  her  faded  recol- 
lection of  incidents.  It  may  be  that  partly  the  shame  of 
alluding  to  them  had  blocked  her  woman's  memory.  For 
one  curious  operation  of  the  charge  of  guiltiness  upon  the 
nearly  guiltless  is  to  make  them  paint  themselves  pure 
white,  to  the  obliteration  of  minor  spots,  until  the  whiteness 
being  acknowledged,  or  the  ordeal  imminent,  the  spots  recur 
and  press  upon  their  consciences.  She  resumed,  in  a  rapid 
undertone:  "You  know  that  a  certain  degree  of  independ- 
ence had  been,  if  not  granted  by  him,  conquered  by  me.  I 
had  the  habit  of  it.  Obedience  with  him  is  imprisonment  — 
he  is  a  blind  wall.  He  received  a  commission,  greatly  to 
his  advantage,  and  was  absent.  He  seems  to  have  received 
information  of  some  sort.  He  returned  unexpectedly,  at  a 
late  hour,  and  attacked  me  at  once,  middling  violent.  My 
friend —  and  that  he  is  !  —  was  coming  from  the  House  for 
a  ten  minutes'  talk,  as  usual,  on  his  way  home,  to  refresh 
him  after  the  long  sitting  and  bear-baiting  he  had  nightly 
to  endure.  Now  let  me  confess :  I  grew  frightened ;  Mr. 
Warwick  was  'off  his  head,'  as  they  say  —  crazy,  and  I 
could  not  bear  the  thought  of  those  two  meeting.    While  he 


DIANA   BEFORE  THE   WORLD  133 

raged  I  threw  open  the  window  and  put  the  lamp  near  it,  to 
expose  the  whole  interior  —  cunning  as  a  veteran  intriguer : 
horrible,  but  it  had  to  be  done  to  keep  them  apart.  He 
asked  me  what  madness  possessed  me,  to  sit  by  an  open 
window  at  midnight,  in  view  of  the  public,  with  a  damp 
wind  blowing.  I  complained  of  want  of  air  and  fanned  my 
forehead.  I  heard  the  steps  on  the  pavement ;  I  stung  him 
to  retort  loudly,  and  I  was  relieved ;  the  steps  passed  on. 
So  the  trick  succeeded  —  the  trick  !  It  was  the  worst  I  was 
guilty  of,  but  it  was  a  trick,  and  it  branded  me  trickster. 
It  teaches  me  to  see  myself  with  an  abyss  in  my  nature  full 
of  infernal  possibilities.  I  think  I  am  hewn  in  black  rock. 
A  woman  who  can  do  as  I  did  by  instinct,  needs  to  have  an 
angel  always  near  her,  if  she  has  not  a  husband  she 
reveres." 

"  We  are  none  of  us  better  than  you,  dear  Tony ;  only 
some  are  more  fortunate,  and  many  are  cowards,"  Emma 
said.  "  You  acted  prudently  in  a  wretched  situation,  partly 
of  your  own  making,  partly  of  the  circumstances.  But  a 
nature  like  yours  could  not  sit  still  and  moan.  That 
marriage  was  to  blame !  The  English  notion  of  women 
seems  to  be  that  we  are  born  white  sheep  or  black :  circum- 
stances have  nothing  to  do  with  our  colour.  They  dread  to 
grant  distinctions,  and  to  judge  of  us  discerningly  is  beyond 
them.  Whether  the  fiction,  that  their  homes  are  purer 
than  elsewhere,  helps  to  establish  the  fact,  I  do  not  know : 
there  is  a  class  that  does  live  honestly ;  and  at  any  rate  it 
springs  from  a  liking  for  purity ;  but  I  am  sure  that  their 
method  of  impressing  it  on  women  has  the  dangers  of  things 
artificial.  They  narrow  their  understanding  of  human 
nature,  and  that  is  not  the  way  to  improve  the  breed." 

"  I  suppose  we  women  are  taken  to  be  the  second  thoughts 
of  the  Creator;  human  nature's  fringes,  mere  finishing 
touches,  not  a  part  of  the  texture,"  said  Diana;  "the 
pretty  ornamentation.  However,  I  fancy  I  perceive  some 
tolerance  growing  in  the  minds  of  the  dominant  sex.  Our 
old  lawyer,  Mr.  Braddock,  who  appears  to  have  no  distaste 
for  conversations  with  me,  assures  me  he  expects  the  day  to 
come  when  women  will  be  encouraged  to  work  at  crafts  and 
professions  for  their  independence.  That  is  the  secret  of 
the  opinion  of  us  at  present  —  our  dependency.    Give  us  the 


134  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

means  of  independence,  and  we  will  gain  it,  and  have  a  turn 
at  judging  you,  my  lords !  You  shall  behold  a  world 
reversed.  Whenever  I  am  distracted  by  existing  circum- 
stances, I  lay  my  finger  on  the  material  conditions,  and  I 
touch  the  secret.  Individually,  it  may  be  moral  with  us ; 
collectively,  it  is  material  —  gross  wrongs,  gross  hungers. 
I  am  a  married  rebel,  and  thereof  comes  the  social  rebel.  I 
was  once  a  dancing  and  singing  girl.  You  remember  the 
night  of  the  Dublin  Ball.  A  Channel  sea  in  uproar,  stirred 
by  witches,  flows  between.'* 

*'You  are  as  lovely  as  you  were  then  —  I  could  say, 
lovelier,"  said  Emma. 

"  I  have  unconquerable  health,  and  I  wish  I  could  give 
you  the  half  of  it,  dear.  I  work  late  into  the  night,  and  I 
wake  early  and  fresh  in  the  morning.  I  do  not  sing,  that 
is  all.  A  few  days  more,  and  my  character  will  be  up 
before  the  Bull's  Head  to  face  him  in  the  arena.  The 
worst  of  a  position  like  mine  is,  that  it  causes  me  inces- 
santly to  think  and  talk  of  myself.  I  believe  I  think  less 
than  I  talk,  but  the  subject  is  growing  stale ;  as  those  who 
are  long  dying  feel,  I  dare  say  —  if  they  do  not  take  it  as 
the  compensation  for  their  departure." 

The  Bull's  Head,  or  British  Jury  of  Twelve,  with  the 
wig  on  it,  was  faced  during  the  latter  half  of  a  week  of 
good  news.  First,  Mr.  Thomas  Bed  worth  was  returned  to 
Parliament  by  a  stout  majority  for  the  Borough  of  Orry- 
bridge  :  the  Hon.  Percy  Dacier  delivered  a  brilliant  speech 
in  the  House  of  Commons,  necessarily  pleasing  to  his  uncle ; 
Lord  Larrian  obtained  the  command  of  the  Rock :  the  house 
of  The  Crossways  was  let  to  a  tenant  approved  by  Mr. 
Braddock :  Diana  received  the  opening  proof-sheets  of  her 
little  volume,  and  an  instalment  of  the  modest  honorarium : 
and  finally,  the  Plaintiff  in  the  suit  involving  her  name  was 
adjudged  to  have  not  proved  his  charge. 

She  heard  of  it  without  a  change  of  countenance. 
She  could  not  have  wished  it  the  reverse;  she  was 
exonerated.  But  she  was  not  free ;  far  from  that ;  and 
she  revenged  herself  on  the  friends  who  made  much  of  her 
triumph  and  overlooked  her  plight,  by  showing  no  sign  of 
satisfaction.  There  was  in  her  bosom  a  revolt  at  the  legal 
consequences  of  the  verdict  —  or  blunt  acquiescence  of  the 


DIANA  BEFORE  THE    WORLD  135 

Law  in  the  conditions  possibly  to  be  imposed  on  her  unless 
she  went  straight  to  the  relieving  phial ;  and  the  burden  of 
keeping  it  under,  set  her  wildest  humour  alight,  somewhat 
as  Redworth  remembered  of  her  on  the  journey  from  The 
Crossways  to  Copsley.  This  ironic  fury,  coming  of  the 
contrast  of  the  outer  and  the  inner,  would  have  been  in- 
dulged to  the  extent  of  permanent  injury  to  her  disposition 
had  not  her  beloved  Emma,  immediately  after  the  tension 
of  the  struggle  ceased,  required  her  tenderest  aid.  Lady 
Dunstane  chanted  victory,  and  at  night  collapsed.  By  the 
advice  of  her  physician  she  was  removed  to  Copsley,  where 
Diana's  labour  of  anxious  nursing  restored  her  through  love 
to  a  saner  spirit.  The  hopefulness  of  life  must  bloom  again 
in  the  heart  whose  prayers  are  offered  for  a  life  dearer  than 
its  own  to  be  preserved.  A  little  return  of  confidence  in 
Sir  Lukin  also  refreshed  her  when  she  saw  that  the  poor 
creature  did  honestly,  in  his  shaggy  rough  male  fashion, 
reverence  and  cling  to  the  flower  of  souls  he  named  as  his 
wife.  His  piteous  groans  of  self-accusation  during  the 
crisis  haunted  her,  and  made  the  conduct  and  nature  of 
men  a  bewilderment  to  her  still  young  understanding.  Save 
for  the  knot  of  her  sensations  (hardly  a  mental  memory,  but 
a  sullen  knot)  which  she  did  not  disentangle  to  charge  him 
with  his  complicity  in  the  blind  rashness  of  her  marriage, 
she  might  have  felt  sisterly,  as  warmly  as  she  compas- 
sionated him. 

It  was  midwinter  when  Dame  Gossip,  who  keeps  the 
exotic  world  alive  with  her  fanning  whispers,  related  that 
the  lovely  Mrs.  Warwick  had  left  England  on  board  the 
schooner-yacht  Clarissa,  with  Lord  and  Lady  Esquart,  for 
a  voyage  in  the  Mediterranean :  and  (behind  her  hand)  that 
the  reason  was  urgent,  inasmuch  as  she  fled  to  escape  the 
meshes  of  the  terrific  net  of  the  marital  law  brutally 
whirled  to  capture  her  by  the  man  her  husband. 


136  DIANA   OF  THE   CEOSSWAYS 

CHAPTER  XV 

INTRODUCES  THE  HON.  PERCY   DACIER 

The  Gods  of  this  world's  contests,  against  whom  our 
poor  stripped  individual  is  commonly  in  revolt,  are,  as  we 
know,  not  miners,  they  are  reapers ;  and  if  we  appear  no 
longer  on  the  surface,  they  cease  to  bruise  us :  they  will 
allow  an  arena  character  to  be  cleansed  and  made  present- 
able while  enthusiastic  friends  preserve  discretion.  It  is 
of  course  less  than  magnanimity  ;  they  are  not  proposed  to 
you  for  your  worship ;  they  are  little  Gods,  temporary  as 
that  great  wave,  their  parent  human  mass  of  the  hour. 
But  they  have  one  worshipful  element  in  them,  which  is, 
the  divine  insistancy  upon  there  being  two  sides  to  a  case  — ■ 
to  every  case.  And  the  People  so  far  directed  by  them  may 
boast  of  healthfulness.  Let  the  individual  shriek,  the 
innocent,  triumphant,  have  in  honesty  to  admit  the  fact. 
One  side  is  vanquished  according  to  decree  of  Law,  but  the 
superior  Council  does  not  allow  it  to  be  extinguished. 

Diana's  battle  was  fought  shadow ily  behind  her  for  the 
space  of  a  week  or  so,  with  some  advocates  on  behalf  of  the 
beaten  man ;  then  it  became  a  recollection  of  a  beautiful 
woman,  possibly  erring,  misvalued  by  a  husband,  who  was 
neither  a  man  of  the  world  nor  a  gracious  yokefellow,  nor 
anything  to  match  her.  She,  however,  once  out  of  the 
public  flames,  had  to  recall  her  scorchings  to  be  gentle  with 
herself.  Under  a  defeat,  she  would  have  been  angrily  self- 
vindicated.  The  victory  of  the  ashen  laurels  drove  her 
mind  inward  to  gird  at  the  hateful  yoke,  in  compassion  for 
its  pair  of  victims.  Quite  earnestly  by  such  means,  yet 
always  bearing  a  comical  eye  on  her  subterfuges,  she 
escaped  the  extremes  of  personal  blame.  Those  advocates 
of  her  opponent  in  and  out  of  court  compelled  her  honest 
heart  to  search  within  and  own  to  faults.  But  were  they 
not  natural  faults  ?  It  was  her  marriage  ;  it  was  marriage 
in  the  abstract  :  her  own  mistake  and  the  world's  chimsy 
machinery  of  civilization :  these  were  the  capital  offenders : 
not  the  wife   who  would  laugh  ringingly,  and  would  have 


INTRODUCES   THE  HON.   PERCY   DACIER  137 

friends  of  the  other  sex,  and  shot  her  epigrams  at  the 
helpless  despot,  and  was  at  times  —  yes,  vixenish;  a  nature 
driven  to  it,  but  that  was  the  word.  She  was  too  generous 
to  recount  her  charges  against  the  vanquished.  If  his 
wretched  jealousy  had  ruined  her,  the  secret  high  tribunal 
within  her  bosom,  which  judged  her  guiltless  for  putting 
the  sword  between  their  marriage  tie  when  they  stood  as 
one,  because  a  quarrelling  couple  could  not  in  honour  play 
the  embracing,  pronounced  him  just  pardonable.  She 
distinguished  that  he  could  only  suppose,  manlikely,  one 
bad  cause  for  the  division. 

To  this  extent  she  used  her  unerring  brains,  more  openly 
than  on  her  night  of  debate  at  The  Cross  ways.  The  next 
moment  she  was  off  in  vapour,  meditating  grandly  on  her 
independence  of  her  sex  and  the  passions.  Love  !  she  did 
not  know  it ;  she  was  not  acquainted  with  either  the  crim- 
inal or  the  domestic  God,  and  persuaded  herself  that  she 
never  could  be.  She  was  a  Diana  of  coldness,  preferring 
friendship ;  she  could  be  the  friend  of  men.  There  was 
another  who  could  be  the  friend  of  women.  Her  heart 
leapt  to  Kedworth.  Conjuring  up  his  clear  trusty  face,  at 
their  grasp  of  hands  when  parting,  she  thought  of  her  vis- 
ions of  her  future  about  the  period  of  the  Dublin  Ball,  and 
acknowledged,  despite  the  erratic  step  to  wedlock,  a  gain  in 
having  met  and  proved  so  true  a  friend.  His  face,  figure, 
character,  lightest  look,  lightest  word,  all  were  loyal  signs 
of  a  man  of  honour,  cold  as  she ;  he  was  the  man  to  whom 
she  could  have  opened  her  heart  for  inspection.  Rejoicing 
in  her  independence  of  an  emotional  sex,  the  impulsive 
woman  burned  with  a  regret  that  at  their  parting  she  had 
not  broken  down  conventional  barriers  and  given  her  cheek 
to  his  lips  in  the  anti-insular  fashion  with  a  brotherly 
friend.  And  why  not  when  both  were  cold  ?  Spirit  to 
spirit,  she  did,  delightfully  refreshed  by  her  capacity  to  do 
so  without  a  throb.  He  had  held  her  hand  and  looked  into 
her  eyes  half  a  minute,  like  a  dear  comrade  ;  as  little  arous- 
ing her  instincts  of  defensiveness  as  the  clearing  heavens  ; 
and  sisterly  love  for  it  was  his  due,  a  sister's  kiss.  He 
needed  a  sister,  and  should  have  one  in  her.  Emma's  rec- 
ollected talk  of  "  Tom  Redworth  "  painted  him  from  head 
to  foot,  brought  the  living  man  over  the  waters  to  the  deck 


188  DIAKA   OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

of  the  yacht.  A  stout  champion  in  the  person  of  Tom 
Kedworth  was  left  on  British  land;  but  for  some  reason 
past  analysis,  intermixed,  that  is,  among  a  swarm  of  sensa- 
tions, Diana  named  her  champion  to  herself  with  the  formal 
prefix :  perhaps  because  she  knew  a  man's  Christian  name 
to  be  dangerous  handling.  They  differed  besides  frequently 
in  opinion,  when  the  habit  of  thinking  of  him  as  Mr.  Red- 
worth  would  be  best.  Women  are  bound  to  such  small 
observances,  and  especially  the  beautiful  of  the  sisterhood, 
whom  the  world  soon  warns  that  they  carry  explosives  and 
must  particularly  guard  against  the  ignition  of  petty  sparks. 
She  was  less  indiscreet  in  her  thoughts  than  in  her  acts,  as 
is  the  way  with  the  reflective  daughter  of  impulse ;  though 
she  had  fine  mental  distinctions  :  what  she  could  offer  to  do 
"  spirit  to  spirit,"  for  instance,  held  nothing  to  her  mind  of 
the  intimacy  of  calling  the  gentleman  plain  Tom  in  mere 
contemplation  of  him.  Her  friend  and  champion  was  a 
volunteer,  far  from  a  mercenary,  and  he  deserved  the  re- 
ward, if  she  could  bestow  it  unalarmed.  They  were  to  meet 
in  Egypt.  Meanwhile  England  loomed  the  home  of  hostile 
forces  ready  to  shock,  had  she  been  a  visible  planet,  and 
ready  to  secrete  a  virus  of  her  past  history,  had  she  been 
making  new. 

She  was  happily  away,  borne  by  a  whiter  than  swan's 
wing  on  the  sapphire  Mediterranean.  Her  letters  to  Emma 
were  peeps  of  splendour  for  the  invalid :  her  way  of  life  on 
board  the  yacht,  and  sketches  of  her  host  and  hostess  as 
lovers  in  wedlock  on  the  other  side  of  our  perilous  forties ; 
sketches  of  the  bays,  the  towns,  the  people  —  priests,  dames, 
cavaliers,  urchins,  infants,  shifting  groups  of  supple  south- 
erners—  flashed  across  the  page  like  a  web  of  silk,  and 
were  dashed  oft",  redolent  of  herself,  as  lightly  as  the  silvery 
spray  of  the  blue  waves  she  furrowed ;  telling,  without  al- 
lusions to  the  land  behind  her,  that  she  had  dipped  in  the 
wells  of  blissful  oblivion.  Emma  Dunstane,  as  is  usual 
with  those  who  receive  exhilarating  correspondence  from 
makers  of  books,  condemned  the  authoress  in  comparison, 
and  now  first  saw  that  she  had  the  gift  of  writing.  Only 
one  cry ;  "  Italy,  Eden  of  exiles !  "  betrayed  the  seeming  of 
a  moan.  She  wrote  of  her  poet  and  others  immediately. 
Thither  had  they  fled,  with  adieu  to  England ! 


INTRODUCES   THE  HON.    PERCY  DACIER  139 

How  many  have  waved  the  adieu!  And  it  is  England 
nourishing,  England  protecting  them,  England  clothing 
them,  in  the  honours  they  wear.  Only  the  posturing  lower 
natures,  on  the  level  of  their  buskins,  can  pluck  out  the 
pocket-knife  of  sentimental  spite  to  cut  themselves  loose 
from  her  at  heart  in  earnest.  The  higher,  bleed  as  they 
may,  too  pressingly  feel  their  debt.  Diana  had  the  Celtic 
vivid  sense  of  country.  In  England  she  was  Irish,  by 
hereditary,  and  by  wilful  opposition.  Abroad,  gazing  along 
the  waters,  observing,  comparing,  reflecting,  above  all,  read- 
ing of  the  struggles  at  home,  the  things  done  and  attempted, 
her  soul  of  generosity  made  her,  though  not  less  Irish,  a 
daughter  of  Britain.  It  is  at  a  distance  that  striving  coun- 
tries should  be  seen  if  we  would  have  them  in  the  pure 
idea;  and  this  young  woman  of  fervid  mind,  a  reader  of 
public  speeches  and  speculator  on  the  tides  of  politics 
(desirous,  further,  to  feel  herself  rather  more  in  the  pure 
idea),  began  to  yearn  for  England  long  before  her  term 
of  holiday  exile  had  ended.  She  had  been  flattered  by 
her  friend,  her  "  wedded  martyr  at  the  stake,"  as  she 
named  him,  to  believe  that  she  could  exercise  a  judgement 
in  politics  —  could  think,  even  speak  acutely,  on  public 
affairs.  The  reports  of  speeches  delivered  by  the  men  she 
knew  or  knew  of,  set  her  thrilling ;  and  she  fancied  the 
sensibility  to  be  as  independent  of  her  sympathy  with  the 
orators  as  her  political  notions  were  sovereignly  above  a  sex 
devoted  to  trifles,  and  the  feelings  of  a  woman  who  had 
gone  through  fire.  She  fancied  it  confidently,  notwithstand- 
ing a  peculiar  intuition  that  the  plunge  into  the  nobler 
business  of  the  world  would  be  a  haven  of  safety  for  a  wo- 
man with  blood  and  imagination,  when  writing  to  Emma: 
"  Mr.  Redworth's  great  success  in  Parliament  is  good  in 
itself,  whatever  his  views  of  present  questions ;  and  I  do 
not  heed  them  when  I  look  to  what  may  be  done  by  a  man 
of  such  power  in  striking  at  unjust  laws,  which  keep  the 
really  numerically  better-half  of  the  population  in  a  state  of 
slavery.  If  he  had  been  a  lawyer!  It  must  be  a  lawyer's 
initiative  —  a  lawyer's  Bill.  Mr.  Percy  Dacier  also  spoke 
well,  as  might  have  been  expected,  and  his  uncle's  compli- 
ment to  him  was  merited.  Should  you  meet  him  sound  him. 
He   has  read  for  the  Bar,   and  is  younger  than  Mr.  Red- 


140  DIANA   OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

■worth.  The  very  young  men  and  the  old  are  our  hope. 
The  middle-aged  are  hard  and  fast  for  existing  facts.  We 
pick  our  leaders  on  the  slopes,  the  incline  and  decline  of 
the  mountain  —  not  on  the  upper  table-land  midway,  where 
all  appears  to  men  so  solid,  so  tolerably  smooth,  save  for 
a  few  excrescences,  roughnesses,  gradually  to  be  levelled  at 
their  leisure;  which  induces  one  to  protest  that  the  middle- 
age  of  men  is  their  time  of  delusion.  It  is  no  paradox. 
They  may  be  publicly  useful  in  a  small  way,  I  do  not  deny 
it  at  all.  They  must  be  near  the  gates  of  life  —  the  open- 
ing or  the  closing  —  for  their  minds  to  be  accessible  to  the 
urgency  of  the  greater  questions.  Otherwise  the  world  pre- 
sents itself  to  them  under  too  settled  an  aspect  —  unless,  of 
course,  Vesuvian  Revolution  shakes  the  land.  And  that 
touches  only  their  nerves.  I  dream  of  some  old  Judge  ! 
There  is  one  —  if  having  caught  we  could  keep  him.  But  I 
dread  so  tricksy  a  pilot.  You  have  guessed  him  —  the 
ancient  Puck !  We  have  laughed  all  day  over  the  paper 
telling  us  of  his  worrying  the  Lords.  Lady  Esquart  con- 
gratulates her  husband  in  being  out  of  it.  Puck  Men  ride 
and  bewigged  might  perhaps  —  except  that  at  the  critical 
moment  he  would  be  sure  to  plead  allegiance  to  Oberon. 
However,  the  work  will  be  performed  by  some  one:  I  am 
prophetic :  —  when  maidens  are  grandmothers  !  —  when  your 
Tony  is  wearing  a  perpetual  laugh  in  the  unhusbanded 
regions  where  there  is  no  institution  of  the  wedding-tie." 

Por  the  reason  that  she  was  not  to  participate  in  the  re- 
sult of  the  old  Judge's  or  young  hero's  happy  championship 
of  the  cause  of  her  sex,  she  conceived  her  separateness  high 
aloof,  and  actually  supposed  she  was  a  contemplative,  sim- 
ply speculative  political  spirit,  impersonal  albeit  a  w^oman. 
This,  as  Emma,  smiling  at  the  lines,  had  not  to  learn,  was 
always  her  secret  pride  of  fancy  —  the  belief  in  her  pos- 
session of  a  disengaged  intellect. 

The  strange  illusion,  so  clearly  exposed  to  her  corre- 
spondent, was  maintained  through  a  series  of  letters  very 
slightly  descriptive,  dated  from  the  Piraeus,  the  Bosphorus, 
the  coasts  of  the  Crimea,  all  more  or  less  relating  to  the 
latest  news  of  the  journals  received  on  board  the  yacht,  and 
of  English  visitors  fresh  from  the  country  she  now  seemed 
fond  of  calling  "  home."     Politics,  and  gentle   allusions  to 


INTRODUCES   THE  HON.   PERCY  DACIER  141 

the  curious  exhibition  of  "  love  in  marriage  "  shown  by  her 
amiable  host  and  hostess  :  —  "  these  dear  Esquarts,  who  are 
never  tired  of  one  another,  but  courtly  courting,  tempting 
me  to  think  it  possible  that  a  fortunate  selection  and  a 
mutual  deference  may  subscribe  to  human  happiness  :  "  — 
filled  the  paragraphs.  Reviews  of  her  first  literary  venture 
were  mentioned  once :  ''  I  was  well  advised  by  Mr.  Red- 
worth  in  putting  Antonia  for  authoress.  She  is  a  buff 
jerkin  to  the  stripes,  and  I  suspect  that  the  signature  of 
D.  A.  M.,  written  in  full,  would  have  cawed  woefully  to  hear 
that  her  style  is  affected,  her  characters  nullities,  her  clever- 
ness forced,  &c.,  &c.  As  it  is  I  have  much  the  same  con- 
tempt for  poor  Antonia's  performance.  Cease  penning, 
little  fool !  She  writes,  '  with  some  comprehension  of  the 
passion  of  love.'  I  know  her  to  be  a  stranger  to  the  earliest 
cry.  So  you  see,  dear,  that  utter  ignorance  is  the  mother 
of  the  Art.  Dialogues  '  occasionally  pointed.'  She  has  a 
sister  who  may  do  better.  —  But  why  was  I  not  appren- 
ticed to  a  serviceable  profession  or  a  trade  ?  I  perceive 
now  that  a  hanger-on  of  the  market  had  no  right  to  expect 
a  happier  fate  than  mine  has  been." 

On  the  Nile,  in  the  winter  of  the  year,  Diana  met  the 
Hon.  Percy  Dacier.  He  was  introduced  to  her  at  Cairo  by 
Redworth.  The  two  gentlemen  had  struck  up  a  House  of 
Commons  acquaintanceship,  and  finding  themselves  bound 
for  the  same  destination,  had  grown  friendly.  Red  worth's 
arrival  had  been  pleasantly  expected.  She  remarked  on 
Dacier's  presence  to  Emma,  without  sketch  or  note  of  him 
as  other  than  much  esteemed  by  Lord  and  Lady  Esquart. 
These,  with  Diana,  Redworth,  Dacier,  the  German  Eastern 
traveller  Schweizerbarth,  and  the  French  Consul  and  Egyp- 
tologist Duriettp,  composed  a  voyaging  party  up  the  river, 
of  which  expedition  Redworth  was  Lady  Dunstane's  chief 
writer  of  the  records.  His  novel  perceptiveness  and  shrewd- 
ness of  touch  made  them  amusing  ;  and  his  tenderness  to  the 
Beauty's  coquetry  between  the  two  foreign  rivals,  moved  a 
deeper  feeling.  The  German  had  a  guitar,  the  Frenchman 
a  voice ;  Diana  joined  them  in  harmony.  They  complained 
apart  severally  of  the  accompaniment  and  the  singer.  Our 
English  criticized  them  apart ;  and  that  is  at  any  rate  to 
occupy  a  post,  though  it  contributes  nothing  to  entertain* 


142  DIANA  OF  THE   CKOSSWAYS 

ment.  At  home  the  Esquarts  had  sung  duets ;  Diana  had 
assisted  Redworth's  manly  chest-notes  at  the  piano.  Each 
of  them  declined  to  be  vocal.  Diana  sang  alone  for  the 
credit  of  the  country,  Italian  and  French  songs,  Irish  also. 
She  was  in  her  mood  of  Planxty  Kelly  and  Garryowen  all 
the  way.  "  Madame  est  Irlandaise  ?  "  Redworth  heard  the 
Frenchman  say,  and  he  owned  to  what  was  implied  in  the 
answering  tone  of  the  question.  "  We  should  be  dull  dogs 
without  the  Irish  leaven  ! ''  So  Tony  in  exile  still  managed 
to  do  something  for  her  darling  Erin.  The  solitary  woman 
on  her  heights  at  Copsley  raised  an  exclamation  of,  "  Oh  ! 
that  those  two  had  been  or  could  be  united !  "  She  was 
conscious  of  a  mystic  symbolism  in  the  prayer. 

She  was  not  apprehensive  of  any  ominous  intervention  of 
another.  Writing  from  Venice,  Diana  mentioned  Mr. 
Percy  Dacier  as  being  engaged  to  an  heiress  ;  "  A  Miss 
Asper,  niece  of  a  mighty  shipowner,  Mr.  Quintin  Manx, 
Lady  Esquart  tells  me  :  money  fabulous,  and  necessary  to 
a  younger  son  devoured  with  ambition.  The  elder  brother, 
Lord  Creedmore,  is  a  common  Nimrod,  always  absent  in 
Hungary,  Russia,  America,  hunting  somewhere.  Mr.  Dacier 
will  be  in  the  Cabinet  with  the  next  Ministry."  No  more 
of  him.     A  new  work  by  Antonia  was  progressing. 

The  Summer  in  South  Tyrol  passed  like  a  royal  proces- 
sion before  young  eyes  for  Diana,  and  at  the  close  of  it, 
descending  the  Stelvio,  idling  through  the  Valtelline,  Como 
Lake  was  reached,  Diana  full  of  her  work,  living  the  double 
life  of  the  author.  At  Bellagio  one  afternoon  Mr.  Percy 
Dacier  appeared.  She  remembered  subsequently  a  disap- 
pointment she  felt  in  not  beholding  Mr.  Redworth  either 
with  him  or  displacing  him.  If  engaged  to  a  lady,  he  was 
not  an  ardent  suitor ;  nor  was  he  a  pointedly  compliment- 
ary acquaintance.  His  enthusiasm  was  reserved  for  Italian 
scenery.  She  had  already  formed  a  sort  of  estimate  of  his 
character,  as  an  indifferent  observer  may  do,  and  any 
woman  previous  to  the  inflaming  of  her  imagination,  if 
that  is  in  store  for  her ;  and  she  now  fell  to  work  resetting 
the  puzzle  it  became  as  soon  her  positive  conclusions  had 
to  be  shaped  again.  "  But  women  never  can  know  young 
men,"  she  wrote  to  Emma,  after  praising  his  good  repute 
as  one  of  the  brotherhood.      "  He  drops  pretty  sentences 


INTEODUCES  THE  HON.   PERCY   DACIER  143 

now  and  then :  no  compliments ;  milky  nuts.  Of  course 
he  has  a  head,  or  he  would  not  be  where  he  is  —  and  that 
seems  always  to  me  the  most  enviable  place  a  young  man 
can  occupy."  She  observed  in  him  a  singular  conflicting  of 
a  buoyant  animal  nature  with  a  curb  of  studiousness,  as  if 
the  fardels  of  age  were  piling  on  his  shoulders  before  youth 
had  quitted  its  pastures.  His  build  of  limbs  and  his 
features  were  those  of  the  finely-bred  English  ;  he  had  the 
English  taste  for  sports,  games,  manly  diversions  ;  and  in 
the  bloom  of  life,  under  thirty,  his  head  was  given  to  bend. 
The  head  bending  on  a  tall  upright  figure,  where  there  was 
breadth  of  chest,  told  of  weights  working.  She  recollected 
his  open  look,  larger  than  inquiring,  at  the  introduction  to 
her ;  and  it  recurred  when  she  uttered  anything  specially 
taking.  What  it  meant  was  past  a  guess,  though  compar- 
ing it  with  the  frank  directness  of  Redworth's  eyes,  she  saw 
the  difference  between  a  look  that  accepted  her  and  one 
that  dilated  on  two  opinions. 

Her  thought  of  the  gentleman  was  of  a  brilliant  young 
charioteer  in  the  ruck  of  the  race,  watchful  for  his  chance 
to  push  to  the  front;  and  she  could  have  said  that  a  dubi- 
ous consort  might  spoil  a  promising  career.  It  flattered 
her  to  think  that  she  sometimes  prompted  him,  sometimes 
illumined.  He  repeated  sentences  she  had  spoken.  —  "I 
shall  be  better  able  to  describe  Mr.  Dacier  when  you  and 
I  sit  together,  my  Emmy,  and  a  stroke  here  and  there 
completes  the  painting.  Set  descriptions  are  good  for 
puppets.  Living  men  and  women  are  too  various  in  the 
mixture  fashioning  them  —  even  the  '  external  present- 
ment' —  to  be  livingly  rendered  in  a  formal  sketch.  I 
may  tell  you  his  eyes  are  pale  blue,  his  features  regular, 
his  hair  silky,  brownish,  his  legs  long,  his  head  rather 
gtooping  (only  the  head),  his  mouth  commonly  closed; 
these  are  the  facts,  and  you  have  seen  much  the  same  in 
a  nursery  doll.  Such  literary  craft  is  of  the  nursery.  So 
with  landscapes.  The  art  of  the  pen  (we  write  on  dark- 
ness) is  to  rouse  the  inward  vision,  instead  of  labouring 
with  a  Drop-scene  brush,  as  if  it  were  to  the  eye;  because 
Dur  flying  minds  cannot  contain  a  protracted  description. 
That  is  why  the  poets,  who  spring  imagination  with  a 
word  or  a   phrase,,  paint   lastins:   pictures.     The   Shake- 


144  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

spearian,  the  Dantesque,  are  in  a  line,  two  at  most.  He 
lends  an  attentive  ear  when  I  speak,  agrees  or  has  a  quaint 
pucker  of  the  eyebrows  dissenting  inwardly.  He  lacks 
mental  liveliness  —  cheerfulness,  I  should  say,  and  is 
thankful  to  have  it  imparted.  One  suspects  he  would  be 
a  dull  domestic  companion.  He  has  a  veritable  thirst  for 
hopeful  views  of  the  world,  and  no  spiritual  distillery  of 
his  own.  He  leans  to  depression.  Why!  The  broken 
reed  you  call  your  Tony  carries  a  cargo,  all  of  her  manu- 
facture—  she  reeks  of  secret  stills;  and  here  is  a  young 
man  —  a  sapling  oak  —  inclined  to  droop.  His  nature  has 
an  air  of  imploring  me  queje  Varrose!  I  begin  to  perform 
Mrs.  Dr.  Pangloss  on  purpose  to  brighten  him  —  the  mind, 
the  views.  He  is  not  altogether  deficient  in  conversa- 
tional gaiety,  and  he  shines  in  exercise.  But  the  world  is 
a  poor  old  ball  bounding  down  a  hill  —  to  an  Irish  melody 
in  the  evening  generally,  by  request.  So  far  of  Mr.  Percy 
Dacier,  of  whom  I  have  some  hopes  —  distant,  perhaps 
delusive  — that  he  maybe  of  use  to  our  cause.  He  listens. 
It  is  an  auspicious  commencement." 

Lugano  is  the  Italian  lake  most  lovingly  encircled  by 
mountain  arms,  and  every  height  about  it  may  be  scaled 
with  ease.  The  heights  have  their  nest  of  waters  below 
for  a  home  scene,  the  southern  Swiss  peaks,  with  celestial 
Monta  Rosa,  in  prospect.  It  was  there  that  Diana  re- 
awakened, after  the  trance  of  a  deadly  draught,  to  the 
glory  of  the  earth  and  her  share  in  it.  She  wakened 
like  the  Princess  of  the  Kiss;  happily  not  to  kisses;  to 
no  sign,  touch  or  call  that  she  could  trace  backward.  The 
change  befell  her  without  a  warning.  After  writing  delib- 
erately to  her  friend  Emma,  she  laid  down  her  pen  and 
thought  of  nothing;  and  into  this  dreamfulness  a  wine 
passed,  filling  her  veins,  suffusing  her  mind,  quickening 
her  soul:  —  and  coming  whence?  out  of  air,  out  of  the 
yonder  of  air.  She  could  have  imagined  a  seraphic  pres- 
ence in  the  room,  that  bade  her  arise  and  live;  take  the 
cup  of  the  wells  of  youth  arrested  at  her  lips  by  her  mar- 
riage; quit  her  wintry  bondage  for  warmth,  light,  space, 
the  quick  of  simple  being.  And  the  strange  pure  ecstasy 
was  not  a  transient  electrification ;  it  came  in  waves  on  a 
continuous  tide ;  looking  was  living;  walking  flying.     She 


INTRODUCES   THE  HON.   PERCY  DACIER  145 

hardly  knew  that  she  slept.  The  heights  she  had  seen 
rosy  at  eve  were  marked  for  her  ascent  in  the  dawn.  Sleep 
was  one  wink,  and  fresh  as  the  dewy  field  and  rockflowers 
on  her  way  upward,  she  sprang  to  more  and  more  of 
heaven,  insatiable,  happily  chirruping  over  her  posses- 
sions. The  threading  of  the  town  among  the  dear  common 
people  before  others  were  abroad,  was  a  pleasure:  and 
pleasant  her  solitariness  threading  the  gardens  at  the  base 
of  the  rock,  only  she  astir;  and  the  first  rough  steps  of 
the  winding  footpath,  the  first  closed  buds,  the  sharper 
air,  the  uprising  of  the  mountain  with  her  ascent;  and 
pleasant  too  was  her  hunger  and  the  nibble  at  a  little  loaf 
of  bread.  A  linnet  sang  in  her  breast,  an  eagle  lifted  her 
feet.  The  feet  were  verily  winged,  as  they  are  in  a  season 
of  youth  when  the  blood  leaps  to  light  from  the  pressure 
of  the  under  forces,  like  a  source  at  the  wellheads,  and 
the  whole  creature  blooms,  vital  in  every  energy  as  a  spirit. 
To  be  a  girl  again  was  magical.  She  could  fancy  her  hav- 
ing risen  from  the  dead.  And  to  be  a  girl,  with  a  woman's 
broader  vision  and  receptiveness  of  soul,  with  knowledge 
of  evil,  and  winging  to  ethereal  happiness,  this  was  a 
revelation  of  our  human  powers. 

She  attributed  the  change  to  the  influences  of  nature's 
beauty  and  grandeur.  Nor  had  her  woman's  consciousness 
to  play  the  chrysalis  in  any  shy  recesses  of  her  heart;  she 
was  nowhere  veiled  or  torpid;  she  was  illumined,  like  the 
Salvatore  she  saw  in  the  evening  beams  and  mounted  in 
the  morning's;  and  she  had  not  a  spot  of  secrecy;  all  her 
nature  flew  and  bloomed;  she  was  bird,  flower,  flowing 
river,  a  quivering  sensibility  unweighted,  unshrouded. 
Desires  and  hopes  would  surely  have  weighted  and 
shrouded  her.  She  had  none,  save  for  the  upper  air,  the 
eyes  of  the  mountain. 

Which  was  the  dream  —  her  past  life  or  this  ethereal 
existence?  But  this  ran  spontaneously,  and  the  other  had 
often  been  stimulated  —  her  vivaciousness  on  the  Nile- 
boat,  for  a  recent  example.  She  had  not  a  doubt  that  her 
past  life  was  the  dream,  or  deception :  and  for  the  reason 
that  now  she  was  compassionate,  large  of  heart  toward  all 
beneath  her.  Let  them  but  leave  her  free,  they  were  for- 
given, even  to  prayers  for  their  wellbeing  !     The  plural 

10 


146  DIANA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

number  in  the  case  was  an  involuntary  multiplying  of  the 
single,  coming  of  her  incapacity  during  this  elevation  and 
rapture  of  the  senses  to  think  distinctly  of  that  One  who 
had  discoloured  her  opening  life.  Freedom  to  breathe, 
gaze,  climb,  grow  with  the  grasses,  fly  with  the  clouds,  to 
muse,  to  sing,  to  be  an  unclaimed  self,  dispersed  upon 
earth,  air,  sky ,  to  find  a  keener  transfigured  self  in  that 
radiation  —  she  craved  no  more. 

Bear  in  mind  her  beauty,  her  charm  of  tongue,  her 
present  state  of  white  simplicity  in  fervour:  was  there 
ever  so  perilous  a  woman  for  the  most  guarded  and 
clearest-eyed  of  young  men  to  meet  at  early  morn  upon  a 
mountain  side? 


CHAPTER  XVI 


TREATS   OF   A  MIDNIGHT   BELL,    AND    OF   A   SCENE   OF 
EARLY   MORNING 

On  a  round  of  the  mountains  rising  from  Osteno,  South- 
eastward of  Lugano,  the  Esquart  party  rose  from  the 
natural  grotto  and  headed  their  carriages  up  and  down  the 
defiles,  halting  for  a  night  at  Eovio,  a  little  village  below 
the  Generoso,  lively  with  waterfalls  and  watercourses ;  and 
they  fell  so  in  love  with  the  place,  that  after  roaming  along 
the  flowery  borderways  by  moonlight,  they  resolved  to  rest 
there  two  or  three  days  and  try  some  easy  ascents.  In  the 
diurnal  course  of  nature,  being  pleasantly  tired,  they  had 
the  avowed  intention  of  sleeping  there;  so  they  went  early 
to  their  beds,  and  carelessly  wished  one  another  good- 
night, none  of  them  supposing  slumber  to  be  anywhere  one 
of  the  warlike  arts,  a  paradoxical  thing  you  must  battle 
for  and  can  only  win  at  last  when  utterly  beaten.  Hard 
by  their  inn,  close  enough  for  a  priestly  homily  to  have 
been  audible,  stood  a  church  campanile,  wherein  hung  a 
Bell,  not  ostensibly  communicating  with  the  demons  of 
the  pit ;  in  daylight  rather  a  merry  comrade.  But  at  night, 
when  the  children  of  nerves  lay  stretched,  he  threw  off  the 
mask.     As  soon  as  they  had  fairly  nestled,  he  smote  their 


A  MIDNIGHT  BELL  AND  EARLY  MORNING        147 

pillows  a  shattering  blow,  loud  for  the  retold  preluding 
quarters,  incredibly  clanging  the  number  ten.  Then  he 
waited  for  neighbouring  campauili  to  box  the  ears  of  slum- 
ber's votaries  in  turn;  whereupon,  under  pretence  of  exces- 
sive conscientiousness,  or  else  oblivious  of  his  antecedent 
damnable  misconduct,  or  perhaps  in  actual  league  and 
trapdoor  conspiracy  with  the  surging  goblin  hosts  beneath 
us,  he  resumed  his  blaring  strokes,  a  sonorous  recapitula- 
tion of  the  number;  all  the  others  likewise.  It  was  an 
alarum  lit  to  warn  of  Attila  or  Alaric;  and  not  simj^ly  the 
maniacal  noise  invaded  the  fruitful  provinces  of  sleep  like 
Hun  and  Vandal,  the  irrational  repetition  ploughed  the 
minds  of  those  unhappy  somnivolents,  leaving  them  worse 
than  sheared  by  barbarians,  disrupt,  as  by  earthquake, 
with  the  unanswerable  question  to  Providence,  Why ! — 
Why  twice? 

Designing   slumberers   are   such   infants.      When   they 
have   undressed  and   stretched   themselves  flat,    it  seems 
that  they  have  really  gone  back  to  their  mothers'  breasts, 
and  they  fret  at  whatsoever  does  not  smack  of  nature,  or 
custom.     The  cause  of  a  repetition  so  senseless  in  its  vio- 
lence, and  so  unnecessary,  set  them  querying  and  kicking 
until  the  inevitable  quarters  recommenced.     Then   arose 
an   insurgent   rabble   in   their   bosoms,    it   might   be   the 
loosened    imps   of    darkness,    urging    them    to    speculate 
whether  the    proximate   monster   about  to   dole   out   the 
eleventh  hour  in  uproar  would  again  forget  himself  and 
repeat  his  dreary  arithmetic  a  second  time ;  for  they  were 
unaware  of  his  religious  obligation,  following  the  hour  of 
tlie  district,  to  inform  them  of  the  tardy  hour  of  Rome. 
They  waited  in  suspense,  curiosity  enabling  them  to  bear 
t^e  tirst  crash  callously.     His  performance  was  the  same. 
And  now  they  took  him  for  a  crazy  engine  whose  madness 
had   infected   the   whole   neighbourhood.      Now   was   the 
moment  to  fight  for  sleep  in  contempt  of  him,  and  they 
began  by  simulating  an  entry  into  the  fortress  they  were 
to  defend,  plunging  on  their  pillows,  battening  down  then- 
eyelids,   breathing  with  a  dreadful  regularity.     Alas!^  it 
came  to  their  knowledge  that  the  Bell  was  in  possession 
:iu.l    they   the    besiegers.     Every   resonant    quarter    was 
i...:ijipated  up  to  the  blow,  without  averting  its  murderous 


148  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

abruptness;  and  an  executioner  Midnight  that  sounded,  in 
addition  to  the  reiterated  quarters,  four  and  twenty  ring- 
ing hammer-strokes,  with  the  aching  pause  between  the 
twelves,  left  them  the  prey  of  the  legions  of  torturers 
which  are  summed,  though  not  described,  in  the  title  of 
a  sleepless  night. 

From  that  period  the  curse  was  milder,  but  the  victims 
raged.  They  swam  on  vasty  deeps,  they  knocked  at  rusty 
gates,  they  shouldered  all  the  weapons  of  black  Insomnia's 
armoury  and  became  her  soldiery,  doing  her  will  upon 
themselves.  Of  her  originally  sprang  the  inspired  teach- 
ing of  the  doom  of  men  to  excruciation  in  endlessness. 
She  is  the  fountain  of  the  infinite  ocean  whereon  the 
exceedingly  sensitive  soul  is  tumbled  everlastingly,  with 
the  diversion  of  hot  pincers  to  appease  its  appetite  for 
change. 

Dacier  was  never  the  best  of  sleepers.  He  had  taken  to 
exercise  his  brains  prematurely,  not  only  in  learning,  but 
also  in  reflection;  and  a  reflectiveness  that  is  indulged 
before  we  have  a  rigid  mastery  of  the  emotions,  or  have 
slain  them,  is  apt  to  make  a  young  man  more  than  com- 
monly a  child  of  nerves:  nearly  as  much  so  as  the  dissi- 
pated, with  the  difference  that  they  are  hilarious  while 
wasting  their  treasury,  which  he  is  not;  and  he  may  re- 
cover under  favouring  conditions,  which  is  a  point  of  van- 
tage denied  to  them.  Physically  he  had  stout  reserves, 
for  he  had  not  disgraced  the  temple.  His  intemperateness 
lay  in  the  craving  to  rise  and  lead :  a  precocious  ambition. 
This  apparently  modest  young  man  started  with  an  aim  — 
and  if  in  the  distance  and  with  but  a  slingstone,  like  the 
slender  shepherd  fronting  the  Philistine,  all  his  energies 
were  in  his  aim  —  at  Government.  He  had  hung  on  the 
fringe  of  an  Administration.  His  party  was  out,  and  he 
hoped  for  higher  station  on  its  return  to  power.  Many 
perplexities  were  therefore  buzzing  about  his  head;  among 
them  at  present  one  sufficiently  magnified  and  voracious 
to  swallow  the  remainder.  He  added  force  to  the  inter- 
rogation as  to  why  that  Bell  should  sound  its  inhuman 
strokes  twice,  by  asking  himself  why  he  was  there  to  hear 
it !  A  strange  suspicion  of  a  bewitchment  might  have 
enlightened  him  if  he  had  been  a  man  accustomed  to  yield 


A  MIDNIGHT  BELL  AND   EARLY   MORNING         149 

to  tlie  peculiar  kind  of  sorcery  issuing  from  that  sex.  He 
rather  despised  the  power  of  women  over  men :  and  never- 
theless he  was  there,  listening  to  that  Bell,  instead  of 
having  obeyed  the  call  of  his  family  duties,  when  the 
latter  were  urgent.  He  had  received  letters  at  Lugano, 
summoning  him  home,  before  he  set  forth  on  his  present 
expedition.  The  noisy  alarum  told  him  he  floundered  in 
quags,  like  a  silly  creature  chasing  a  marsh-lamp.  But 
was  it  so?  Was  it  not,  on  the  contrary,  a  serious  pursuit 
of  the  secret  of  a  woman's  character?  —  Oh,  a  woman  and 
her  character !  Ordinary  women  and  their  characters  might 
set  to  work  to  get  what  relationship  and  likeness  they 
could.  They  had  no  secret  to  allure.  This  one  had:  she 
had  the  secret  of  lake  waters  under  rock,  unfathomable  in 
limpidness.  He  could  not  think  of  her  without  shooting 
at  nature,  and  nature's  very  sweetest  and  subtlest,  for 
comparisons.  As  to  her  sex,  his  active  man's  contempt 
of  the  petticoated  secret  attractive  to  boys  and  graylings, 
made  him  believe  that  in  her  he  hunted  the  mind  and  the 
spirit:  perchance  a  double  mind,  a  twilighted  spirit;  but 
not  a  mere  woman.  She  bore  no  resemblance  to  the  bundle 
of  women.  Well,  she  was  worth  studying;  she  had  ideas, 
and  could  give  ear  to  ideas.  Furthermore,  a  couple  of  the 
members  of  his  family  inclined  to  do  her  injustice.  At 
least,  they  judged  her  harshly,  owing,  he  thought,  to  an 
inveterate  opinion  they  held  regarding  Lord  Dannisburgh's 
obliquity  in  relation  to  women.  He  shared  it,  and  did  not 
concur  in  their  verdict  upon  the  woman  implicated.  That 
is  to  say,  knowing  something  of  her  now,  he  could  see  the 
possibility  of  her  innocence  in  the  special  charm  that  her 
mere  sparkle  of  features  and  speech,  and  her  freshness 
would  have  for  a  man  like  his  uncle.  The  possibility 
pleaded  strongly  on  her  behalf,  while  the  darker  possi- 
bility weighted  by  his  uncle's  reputation  plucked  at  him 
from  below. 

She  was  delightful  to  hear,  delightful  to  see;  and  her 
friends  loved  her  and  had  faith  in  her.  So  clever  a 
woman  might  be  too  clever  for  her  friends!  .   .  . 

The  circle  he  moved  in  hummed  of  women,  prompting 
novices  as  well  as  veterans  to  suspect  that  the  multitude 
of  them,  and  notably  the  fairest,  yet  more  the  cleverest, 
concealed  the  serpent  somewhere. 


150  BIAXA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

She  certainly  had  not  directed  any  of  her  arts  upon  him. 
Besides  he  was  half  engaged.  And  that  was  a  burning 
perplexity;  not  because  of  abstract  scruples  touching  the 
necessity  for  love  in  marriage.  The  young  lady,  great 
heiress  though  she  was,  and  willing,  as  she  allowed  him 
to  assume  J  graceful  too,  reputed  a  beauty;  struck  him 
cold.  He  fancied  her  transparent,  only  Arctic.  Her 
transparency  displayed  to  him  all  the  common  virtues, 
and  a  serene  possession  of  the  inestimable  and  eminent 
one  outweighing  all;  but  charm,  wit,  ardour,  interccm- 
municative  quickness,  and  kindling  beauty,  airy  grace, 
were  qualities  that  a  man,  it  seemed,  had  to  look  for  in 
women  spotted  by  a  doubt  of  their  having  the  chief  and 
priceless. 

However,  he  was  not  absolutely  plighted.  Nor  did  it 
matter  to  him  whether  this  or  that  woman  concealed  the 
tail  of  the  serpent  and  trail,  excepting  the  singular  interest 
this  woman  managed  to  excite,  and  so  deeply  as  set  him 
wondering  how  that  Resurrection  Bell  might  be  affecting 
her  ability  to  sleep.  Was  she  sleeping?  —  or  waking? 
His  nervous  imagination  was  a  torch  that  alternately  lighted 
her  lying  asleep  with  the  innocent,  like  a  babe,  and  toss- 
ing beneath  the  overflow  of  her  dark  hair,  hounded  by 
haggard  memories.  She  fluttered  before  him  in  either 
aspect;  and  another  perplexity  now  was  to  distinguish 
within  himself  which  was  the  aspect  he  preferred.  Great 
Nature  brought  him  thus  to  drink  of  her  beauty,  under  the 
delusion  that  the  act  was  a  speculation  on  her  character. 

The  Bell,  with  its  clash,  throb  and  long  swoon  of  sound, 
reminded  him  of  her  name:  Diana  —  An  attribute?  or  a 
derision? 

It  really  mattered  nothing  to  him,  save  for  her  being 
maligned;  and  if  most  unfairly,  then  that  face  of  the  vary- 
ing expressions,  and  the  rich  voice,  and  the  remembered 
gentle  and  taking  words  coming  from  her,  appealed  to  him 
with  a  supplicating  vividness  that  pricked  his  heart  to 
leap. 

He  was  dozing  when  the  Bell  burst  through  the  thin 
division  between  slumber  and  wakefulness,  recounting  what 
seemed  innumerable  peals,  hard  on  his  cranium.  Gray 
daylight  blanched  the  window  and  the  bed:  his  watch  said 


A  MIDNIGHT   BELL  AISTD   EARLY  MORNINa         151 

five  of  the  morning.  He  thought  of  the  pleasure  of  a  bath 
beneath  some  dashing  sprayshowers,  and  jumped  up  to 
dress,  feeling  a  queer  sensation  of  skin  in  his  clothes,  the 
sign  of  a  feverish  night;  and  yawning  he  went  into  the  air. 
Tjeftward  the  narrow  village- street  led  to  the  footway  along 
which  he  could  make  for  the  mountain -wall.  He  cast  one 
look  at  the  head  of  the  campanile,  silly  as  an  owlish 
roysterer's  glazed  stare  at  the  young  Aurora,  and  hurried 
his  feet  to  check  the  yawns  coming  alarmingly  fast,  in  the 
place  of  ideas. 

His  elevation  above  the  valley  was  about  the  kneecap  of 
the  Generoso.     Waters  of  past  rain-clouds  poured  down 
the  mountain-sides  like  veins   of   metal,   here  and   there 
flinging  off  a  shower  on  the  busy  descent;  only  dubiously 
animate  in  the  lack  lustre  of  the  huge  bulk  piled  against 
a  yellow  East  that  wafted  fleets  of  pinky  cloudlets  over- 
head.    He  mounted  his  path  to  a  level  with  inviting  grass- 
mounds  where  water  circled,  running  from  scoops  and  cups 
to  curves  and  brook-streams,  and  in  his  fancy  calling  to 
him  to  hear  them.     To  dip  in  them  was  his  desire.     To 
roll  and  shiver  braced  by  the   icy  flow  was  the  spell   to 
break  that  baleful  incantation  of  the  intolerable  night;  so 
he  struck  across  a  ridge  of  boulders,  wreck  of  a  landslip 
from   the   height   he   had   hugged,  to  the   open  space  of 
shadowed   undulations,   and   soon   had  his   feet   on   turf. 
Heights  to  right  and  to  left,  and  between  them,  aloft,  a 
sky   the   rosy    wheelcourse  of   the  chariot  of  morn,   and 
below,  among  the  knolls,  choice  of  sheltered  nooks,  where 
waters  whispered  of  secrecy  to  satisfy  Diana  herself.     They 
have  that  whisper  and  waving  of  secrecy  in  secret  scenery; 
they  beckon  to  the  bath;  and  they  conjure  classic  visions 
of  the  pudency  of  the  Goddess  irate  or  unsighted.     The 
semi-mythological  state  of  mind,  built  of  old  images  and 
favouring  haunts,    was  known  to  Dacier.     The  name   of 
Diana,  playing  vaguely  on  his  consciousness,  helped  to  it. 
He  had  no  definite  thought  of  the  mortal  woman  when  the 
highest  grass-roll  near  the  rock  gave  him  view  of  a  bowered 
source  and  of  a  pool  under  a  chain  of  cascades,  bounded 
by  polished  shelves  and  slabs.     The  very  spot  for  him,  he 
decided  at  the  first  peep;  and  at  the  second,  with  fingers 
instinctively  loosening  his   waistcoat-buttons   for  a  com- 


152  DIANA   OP  THE   CROSSWAYS 

mencement,  he  shouldered  round  and  strolled  away,  though 
not  at  a  rapid  pace,  nor  far  before  he  halted. 

That  it  could  be  no  other  than  she,  the  figure  he  had 
seen  standing  beside  the  pool,  he  was  sure.  Why  had  he 
turned?  Thoughts  thick  and  swift  as  a  blush  in  the  cheeks 
of  seventeen  overcame  him;  and  queen  of  all,  the  thought 
bringing  the  picture  of  this  mountain-solitude  to  vindicate 
a  woman  shamefully  assailed.  —  She  who  found  her  pleas- 
ure in  these  haunts  of  nymph  and  Goddess,  at  the  fresh 
cold  bosom  of  nature,  must  be  clear  as  day.  She  trusted 
herself  to  the  loneliness  here,  and  to  the  honour  of  men, 
from  a  like  irreflective  sincereness.  She  was  unable  to 
imagine  danger  where  her  own  impelling  thirst  was 
pure.  .  .  . 

The  thoughts,  it  will  be  discerned,  were  but  flashes  ot 
a  momentary  vivid  sensibility.  Where  a  woman's  charm 
has  won  half  the  battle,  her  character  is  an  advancing 
standard  and  sings  victory,  let  her  do  no  more  than  take  a 
quiet  morning  walk  before  breakfast. 

But  why  had  he  turned  his  back  on  her?  There  was 
nothing  in  his  presence  to  alarm,  nothing  in  her  appear- 
ance to  forbid.  The  motive  and  the  movement  were  equally 
quaint;  incomprehensible  to  him;  for  after  putting  him- 
self out  of  sight,  he  understood  the  absurdity  of  the  sup- 
position that  she  would  seek  the  secluded  sylvan  bath  for 
the  same  purpose  as  he.  Yet  now  he  was  debarred  from 
going  to  meet  her.  She  might  have  an  impulse  to  bathe 
her  feet.     Her  name  was  Diana.   .  .   . 

Yes,  and  a  married  woman ;  and  a  proclaimed  one!  And 
notwithstanding  those  brassy  facts,  he  was  ready  to  side 
with  the  evidence  declaring  her  free  from  stain;  and 
further,  to  swear  that  her  blood  was  Diana's! 

Nor  had  Dacier  ever  been  particularly  poetical  about 
women.  The  present  Diana  had  wakened  his  curiosity, 
had  stirred  his  interest  in  her,  pricked  his  admiration,  but 
gradually,  until  a  sleepless  night  with  its  flock  of  raven- 
fancies  under  that  dominant  Bell,  ended  by  colouring  her, 
the  moment  she  stood  in  his  eyes,  as  freshly  as  the  morn- 
ing heavens.  We  are  much  influenced  in  youth  by  sleep- 
less nights:  they  disarm,  they  predispose  us  to  submit  to 
6oft  occasion;  and  in  our  youth  occasion  is  always  coming. 


A  MIDNIGHT   BELL  AND   EARLY  MORNING         153 

He  heard  her  voice.  She  had  risen  up  the  grass-mound, 
and  he  hung  brooding  half-way  down.  She  was  dressed 
in  some  texture  of  the  hue  of  lavender.  A  violet  scarf 
loosely  knotted  over  the  bosom  opened  on  her  throat.  The 
loop  of  her  black  hair  curved  under  a  hat  of  grey  beaver. 
Memorably  radiant  was  her  face. 

They  met,  exchanged  greetings,  praised  the  beauty  of 
the  morning,  and  struck  together  on  the  Bell.  She  laughed : 
"  I  heard  it  at  ten ;  I  slept  till  four.  I  never  wake  later. 
I  was  out  in  the  air  by  half -past.     Were  you  disturbed?  " 

He  alluded  to  his  troubles  with  the  Bell. 

"It  sounded  like  a  felon's  heart  in  skeleton  ribs,"  he 
said. 

"Or  a  proser's  tongue  in  a  hollow  skull,"  said  she. 

He  bowed  to  her  conversible  readiness,  and  at  once 
fell  into  the  background,  as  he  did  only  with  her,  to  per- 
form accordant  bass  in  their  dialogue ;  for  when  a  woman 
lightly  caps  our  strained  remarks,  we  gallantly  surren- 
der the  leadership,  lest  she  should  too  cuttingly  assert 
her  claim. 

Some  sweet  wild  cyclamen  flowers  were  at  her  breast. 
She  held  in  her  left  hand  a  bunch  of  buds  and  blown  cups 
of  the  pale  purple  meadow-crocus.  He  admired  them. 
She  told  him  to  look  round.  He  confessed  to  not  having 
noticed  them  in  the  grass:  what  was  the  name?  Colchi- 
cum,  in  Botany,  she  said. 

"These  are  plucked  to  be  sent  to  a  friend;  otherwise 
I  'm  reluctant  to  take  the  life  of  flowers  for  a  whim. 
Wild  flowers,  I  mean.  I  am  not  sentimental  about  garden 
flowers:  they  are  cultivated  for  decoration,  grown  for 
clipping." 

"I  suppose  they  don't  carry  the  same  signification," 
said  Dacier,  in  the  tone  of  a  pupil  to  such  themes. 

''They  carry  no  feeling,"  said  she.  "And  that  is  my 
excuse  for  plucking  these,  where  they  seem  to  spring  like 
our  town-dream  of  happiness.  I  believe  they  are  sensible 
of  it  too;  but  these  must  do  service  to  my  invalid  friend, 
who  cannot  travel.  Are  you  ever  as  much  interested  in 
the  woes  of  great  ladies  as  of  country  damsels?  I  am  not 
—  not  unless  they  have  natural  distinction.  You  have 
met  Lady  Dunstane?" 


154  mANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

The  question  sounded  artless.  Dacier  answered  that  he 
thought  he  had  seen  her  somewhere  once,  and  Diana  shut 
her  lips  on  a  rising  under-smile. 

"  She  is  the  cceur  d^or  of  our  time :  the  one  soul  I  would 
sacrifice  these  flowers  to." 

"A  bit  of  a  blue-stocking,  I  think  I  have  heard  said." 

"  She  might  have  been  admitted  to  the  Hotel  Rambouillet, 
without  being  anything  of  a  Precieuse.  She  is  the  woman 
of  the  largest  heart  now  beating." 

"Mr.  Redworth  talked  of  her." 

"As  she  deserved,  I  am  sure." 

"Very  warmly." 

"He  would  I" 

"He  told  me  you  were  the  Damon  and  Pythias  of 
women." 

"  Her  one  fault  is  an  extreme  humility  that  makes  her 
always  play  second  to  me ;  and  as  I  am  apt  to  gabble,  I 
take  the  lead;  and  I  am  froth  in  comparison.  I  can  rever- 
ence my  superiors  even  when  tried  by  intimacy  with  them. 
She  is  the  next  heavenly  thing  to  heaven  that  I  know. 
Court  her,  if  ever  you  come  across  her.  Or  have  you  a 
man's  horror  of  women  with  brains?" 

"Am  I  expressing  it?"  said  he. 

"Do  not  breathe  London  or  Paris  here  on  me."  She 
fanned  the  crocuses  under  her  chin.  "The  early  morning 
always  has  this  —  I  wish  I  had  a  word  !  —  touch  .  .  . 
whisper  .  .  .  gleam  .  .  .  beat  of  wings  —  I  envy  poets 
now  more  than  ever !  —  of  Eden,  I  was  going  to  say.  Prose 
can  paint  evening  and  moonlight,  but  poets  are  needed  to 
sing  the  dawn.  That  is  because  prose  is  equal  to  melan- 
choly stuff.  Gladness  requires  the  finer  language.  Other- 
wise we  have  it  coarse  —  anything  but  a  reproduction. 
You  politicians  despise  the  little  distinctions  '  twixt 
tweedledum  and  tweedledee,'  I  fancy." 

Of  the  poetic  sort,  Dacier's  uncle  certainly  did.  For 
himself  he  confessed  to  not  having  thought  much  on  them. 

"  But  how  divine  is  utterance ! "  she  said.  "  As  we  to 
the  brutes,  poets  are  to  us." 

He  listened  somewhat  with  the  head  of  the  hanged.  A 
beautiful  woman  choosing  to  rhapsodize  has  her  way,  and 
is  not  subjected  to  the  critical  commentary  within  us.     He 


A  MIDNIGHT   BELL   AND   EARLY   MORNING        155 

wondered  whether  she  had  discoursed  in  such  a  fashiou  to 
his  uncle. 

"I  can  read  good  poetry,"  said  he. 

"  If  you  would  have  this  valley  —  or  mountain-cleft,  one 
should  call  it  —  described,  only  verse  could  do  it  for  you," 
Diana  pursued,  and  stopped,  glanced  at  his  face  and 
smiled.  She  had  spied  the  end  of  a  towel  peeping  out  of 
one  of  his  pockets.  "  You  came  out  for  a  bath  !  Go  back, 
by  all  means,  and  mount  that  rise  of  grass  where  you  first 
saw  me;  and  down  on  the  other  side,  a  little  to  the  right, 
you  will  find  the  very  place  for  a  bath,  at  a  corner  of  the 
rock  —  a  natural  fountain ;  a  bubbling  pool  in  a  ring  of 
brushwood,  with  falling  water,  so  tempting  that  I  could 
have  pardoned  a  push :  about  five  feet  deep.     Lose  no  time." 

He  begged  to  assure  her  that  he  would  rather  stroll  with 
her:  it  had  been  only  a  notion  of  bathing  by  chance  when 
he  pocketed  the  towel. 

"Dear  me,"  she  cried,  "if  I  had  been  a  man  I  should 
have  scurried  off  at  a  signal  of  release,  quick  as  a  hare  I 
once  woke  up  in  a  field  with  my  foot  on  its  back." 

Dacier's  eyebrows  knotted  a  trifle  over  her  eagerness  to 
dismiss  him :  he  was  not  used  to  it,  but  rather  to  be  courted 
by  women,  and  to  condescend. 

"I  shall  not  long,  I  'm  afraid,  have  the  pleasure  of  walk- 
ing beside  you  and  hearing  you.  I  had  letters  at  Lugano. 
My  uncle  is  unwell,  I  hear." 

"Lord  Dannisburgh?" 

The  name  sprang  from  her  lips  unhesitatingly. 

His  nodded  affirmative  altered  her  face  and  her  voice. 

"It  is  not  a  grave  illness?" 

"They  rather  fear  it." 

"You  had  the  news  at  Lugano?  " 

He  answered  the  implied  reproach:  "I  can  be  of  no 
service." 

"But  surely!" 

"It 's  even  doubtful  that  he  would  be  bothered  to  receive 
me.     We  hold  no  views  in  common  —  excepting  one." 

"Could  I?"  she  exclaimed.  "0  that  I  might !  If  he 
is  really  ill!  But  if  it  is  actually  serious  he  would  per- 
haps have  a  wish  ...  I  can  nurse.  I  know  I  have  the 
power  to  cheer  him.     You  ought  indeed  to  be  in  England." 


156  DIANA   OF   THE   CEOSSWAYS 

Dacier  said  he  had  thought  it  better  to  wait  for  later 
reports.  "  I  shall  drive  to  Lugano  this  afternoon,  and  act 
on  the  information  I  get  there.  Probably  it  ends  my 
holiday." 

"Will  you  do  me  the  favour  to  write  me  word?  —  and 
especially  tell  me  if  you  think  he  would  like  to  have  me 
near  him,"  said  Diana.  "And  let  him  know  that  if  he 
wants  nursing  or  cheerful  companionship,  I  am  at  any 
moment  ready  to  come." 

The  flattery  of  a  beautiful  young  woman  to  wait  on  him 
would  be  very  agreeable  to  Lord  Dannisburgh,  Dacier 
conceived.  Her  offer  to  go  was  possibly  purely  charitable. 
But  the  prudence  of  her  occupation  of  the  post  obscured 
whatever  appeared  admirable  in  her  devotedness.  Her 
choice  of  a  man  like  Lord  Dannisburgh  for  the  friend  to 
whom  she  could  sacrifice  her  good  name  less  falteringly 
than  she  gathered  those  field-flowers  was  inexplicable; 
and  she  herself  a  darker  riddle  at  each  step  of  his 
reading. 

He  promised  curtly  to  write.  "I  will  do  my  best  to  hit 
a  flying  address." 

"Your  Club  enables  me  to  hit  a  permanent  one  that  will 
establish  the  communication," said  Diana.  "We  shall  not 
sleep  another  night  atRovio.  LadyEsquart  is  the  lightest 
of  sleepers,  and  if  you  had  a  restless  time,  she  and  her 
husband  must  have  been  in  purgatory.  Besides,  permit 
me  to  say,  you  should  be  with  your  party.  The  times  are 
troublous  —  not  for  holidays  !  Your  holiday  has  had  a 
haunted  look,  creditably  to  your  conscience  as  a  politician. 
These  Corn  Law  agitations  I  " 

"Ah,  but  no  politics  here!  "  said  Dacier. 

"Politics  everywhere!  —  in  the  Courts  of  Faery  !  They 
are  not  discord  to  me." 

"But  not  the  last  day  —  the  last  hour!  "  he  pleaded. 

"Well!  only  do  not  forget  your  assurance  to  me  that 
you  would  give  some  thoughts  to  Ireland  —  and  the  cause 
of  women.     Has  it  slipped  from  your  memory?" 

"  If  I  see  the  chance  of  serving  you,  you  may  trust  to 
me." 

She  sent  up  an  interiecti^on  on  the  misfortune  of  her  not 
^ringr  been  Dom  a  ai;i?J> 


A  MIDNIGHT   BELL  AND  EARLY   MORNING        157 

It  was  to  him  the  one  smart  of  sourness  in  her  charm  as 
a  woman. 

Among  the  boulder-stones  of  the  ascent  to  the  path,  he 
ventured  to  propose  a  little  masculine  assistance  in  a  hand 
stretched  mutely.  Although  there  was  no  great  need  for 
help,  her  natural  kindliness  checked  the  inclination  to 
refuse  it.  When  their  hands  disjoined  she  found  herself 
reddening.  She  cast  it  on  the  exertion.  Her  heart  was 
throbbing.     It  might  be  the  exertion  likewise. 

He  walked  and  talked  much  more  airily  along  the 
descending  pathway,  as  if  he  had  suddenly  become  more 
intimately  acquainted  with  her. 

She  listened,  trying  to  think  of  the  manner  in  which  he 
might  be  taught  to  serve  that  cause  she  had  at  heart;  and 
the  colour  deepened  on  her  cheeks  till  it  set  fire  to  her 
underlying  consciousness:  blood  to  spirit.  A  tremor  of 
alarm  ran  through  her. 

His  request  for  one  of  the  crocuses  to  keep  as  a  souvenir 
of  the  morning  was  refused.  ''  They  are  sacred;  they  were 
all  devoted  to  my  friend  when  I  plucked  them." 

He  pointed  to  a  half -open  one,  with  the  petals  in  dis- 
parting pointing  to  junction,  and  compared  it  to  the  famous 
tiptoe  ballet-posture,  arms  above  head  and  fingers  like 
swallows  meeting  in  air,  of  an  operatic  danseuse  of  the 
time. 

"I  do  not  see  it,  because  I  will  not  see  it,"  she  said, 
and  she  found  a  personal  cooling  and  consolement  in  the 
phrase.  — 'We  have  this  power  of  resisting  invasion  of  the 
poetic  by  the  commonplace,  the  spirit  by  the  blood,  if  we 
please,  though  you  men  may  not  think  that  we  have !  — 
Her  alarmed  sensibilities  bristled  and  made  head  against 
him  as  an  enemy.  She  fancied  (for  the  aforesaid  reason 
—  because  she  chose)  that  it  was  on  account  of  the  ofi'ence 
to  her  shy  morning  pleasure  by  his  Londonizing.  At  any 
other  moment  her  natural  liveliness  and  trained  social  ease 
would  have  taken  any  remark  on  the  eddies  of  the  tide  of 
converse;  and  so  she  told  herself,  and  did  not  the  less 
feel  wounded,  adverse,  armed.  He  seemed  somehow  to 
have  dealt  a  mortal  blow  to  the  happy  girl  she  had  become 
again.  The  woman  she  was  protested  on  behalf  of  the 
girl,  while  the  girl  in  her  heart  bent  lowered  sad  eyelids 


158  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

to  the  woman ;  and  which  of  them  was  wiser  of  the  truth 
she  could  not  have  said,  for  she  was  honestly  not  aware  of 
the  truth,  but  she  knew  she  was  divided  in  halves,  with 
one  half  pitying  the  other,  one  rebuking:  and  all  because 
of  the  incongruous  comparison  of  a  wild  flower  to  an  opera 
dancer!  Absurd  indeed.  We  human  creatures  are  the 
silliest  on  earth,  most  certainly. 

Dacier  had  observed  the  blush,  and  the  check  to  her 
flowing  tongue  did  not  escape  him  as  they  walked  back 
to  the  inn  down  the  narrow  street  of  black  rooms,  where 
the  women  gossiped  at  the  fountain  and  the  cobbler 
threaded  on  his  doorstep.  His  novel  excitement  supplied 
the  deficiency,  sweeping  him  past  minor  reflections.  He 
was,  however,  surprised  to  hear  her  tell  Lady  Esquart,  as 
soon  as  they  were  together  at  the  breakfast-table,  that  he 
had  the  intention  of  starting  for  England;  and  further 
surprised,  and  slightly  stung  too,  when  on  the  poor  lady's 
moaning  over  her  recollection  of  the  midnight  Bell,  and 
vowing  she  could  not  attempt  to  sleep  another  night  in  the 
place,  Diana  declared  her  resolve  to  staj^  there  one  day 
longer  with  her  maid,  and  explore  the  neighbourhood  for 
the  wild  flowers  in  which  it  abounded.  Lord  and  Lady 
Esquart  agreed  to  anything  agreeable  to  her,  after  excusing 
themselves  for  the  necessitated  flight,  piteously  relating 
the  story  of  their  sufferings.  My  lord  could  have  slept, 
but  he  had  remained  awake  to  comfort  my  lady. 

"  True  knightliness  ! "  Diana  said,  in  praise  of  these 
long  married  lovers ;  and  she  asked  them  what  they  had 
talked  of  during  the  night. 

"  You,  my  dear,  partly,"  said  Lady  Esquart. 

"  For  an  opiate  ?  " 

"  An  invocation  of  the  morning,'*  said  Dacier. 

Lady  Esquart  looked  at  Diana  and  at  him.  She  thought 
it  was  well  that  her  fair  friend  should  stay.  It  was  then 
settled  for  Diana  to  rejoin  them  the  next  evening  at  Lugano, 
thence  to  proceed  to  Luino  on  the  Maggiore. 

"  I  fear  it  is  good-bye  for  me,''  Dacier  said  to  her,  as  he 
was  about  to  step  into  the  carriage  with  the  Esquarts. 

"  If  you  have  not  better  news  of  your  uncle,  it  must  be," 
she  replied,  and  gave  him  her  hand  promptly  and  formally, 
hardly  diverting  her  eyes  from  Lady  Esquart  to  grace  the 


A  ^HDNIGHT  BELL  AND   EARLY   MORNING        159 

temporary  gift  with  a  look.  The  last  of  her  he  saw  was  a 
waving  of  her  arm  and  a  finger  pointing  triumphantly  at 
the  Bell  in  the  tower.  It  said,  to  an  understanding  un- 
practised in  the  feminine  mysteries  :  "  I  can  sleep  through 
anything."  What  that  revealed  of  her  state  of  conscience 
and  her  nature,  his  efforts  to  preserve  the  lovely  optical 
figure  blocked  his  guessing.  He  was  with  her  friends,  who 
liked  her  the  more  they  knew  her,  and  he  was  compelled  to 
lean  to  their  view  of  the  perplexing  woman. 

"  She  is  a  riddle  to  the  world,"  Lady  Esquart  said,  "  but 
I  know  that  she  is  good.  It  is  the  best  of  signs  when 
women  take  to  her  and  are  proud  to  be  her  friend." 

My  lord  echoed  his  wife.  She  talked  in  this  homely 
manner  to  stop  any  notion  of  philandering  that  the  young 
gentleman  might  be  disposed  to  entertain  in  regard  to  a 
lady  so  attractive  to  the  pursuit  as  Diana's  beauty  and 
delicate  situation  might  make  her  seem. 

<*  She  is  an  exceedingly  clever  person,  and  handsomer 
than  report,  which  is  uncommon,"  said  Dacier,  becoming 
voluble  on  town-topics.  Miss  Asper  incidentally  among 
them.  He  denied  Lady  Esquart's  charge  of  an  engage- 
ment ;  the  matter  hung. 

His  letters  at  Lugano  summoned  him  to  England  in- 
stantly. 

"I  have  taken  leave  of  Mrs.  Warwick,  but  tell  her  I 
regret,  et  caetera,"  he  said  ;  "and  by  the  way,  as  my  uncle's 
illness  appears  to  be  serious,  the  longer  she  is  absent  the 
better,  perhaps." 

"It  would  never  do,"  said  Lady  Esquart,  understanding 
his  drift  immediately.  "  We  winter  in  Kome.  She  will  not 
abandon  us  —  I  have  her  word  for  it.  Next  Easter  we  are 
in  Paris ;  and  so  home,  I  suppose.  There  will  be  no  hurry 
before  we  are  due  at  Cowes.  We  seem  to  have  become  con- 
firmed wanderers ;  for  two  of  us  at  least  it  is  likely  to  be 
our  last  great  tour." 

Dacier  informed  her  that  he  had  pledged  his  word  to 
write  to  Mrs.  Warwick  of  his  uncle's  condition,  and  the 
several  appointed  halting-places  of  the  Esquarts  between 
the  lakes  and  Florence  were  named  to  him.  Thus  all  things 
were  openly  treated ;  all  had  an  air  of  being  on  the  surface ; 
the   communications  passing  between  Mrs.  Warwick  and 


160  DIANA  OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

the  Hon.  Percy  Dacier  might  have  been  perused  by  all  the 
world.  None  but  that  portion  of  it,  sage  in  suspiciousness, 
which  objects  to  such  communications  under  any  circum- 
stances, could  have  detected  in  their  correspondence  a  spark 
of  coming  fire  or  that  there  was  common  warmth.  She  did 
not  feel  it,  nor  did  he.  The  position  of  the  two  interdicted 
it  to  a  couple  honourably  sensible  of  social  decencies ;  and 
who  were,  be  it  added,  kept  apart.  The  blood  is  the 
treacherous  element  in  the  story  of  the  nobly  civilized,  of 
which  secret  Diana,  a  wife  and  no  wife,  a  prisoner  in  liberty, 
a  blooming  woman  imagining  herself  restored  to  tran- 
scendent maiden  ecstasies  —  the  highest  youthful  poetic  — 
had  received  some  faint  intimation  when  the  blush  flamed 
suddenly  in  her  cheeks  and  her  heart  knelled  like  the 
towers  of  a  city  given  over  to  the  devourer.  She  had  no 
wish  to  meet  him  again.  Without  telling  herself  why,  she 
would  have  shunned  the  meeting.  Disturbers  that  thwarted 
her  simple  happiness  in  sublime  scenery  were  best  avoided. 
She  thought  so  the  more  for  a  fitful  blur  to  the  simplicity 
of  her  sensations,  and  a  task  she  sometimes  had  in  restoring 
and  toning  them,  after  that  sweet  morning  time  in  Rovio. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

"  THE    PRIISrCESS    EGERIA  " 


London,  say  what  we  will  of  it,  is  after  all  the  head  of 
the  British  giant,  and  if  not  the  liveliest  in  bubbles,  it  is 
past  competition  the  largest  broth-pot  of  brains  anywhere 
simmering  on  the  hob :  over  the  steadiest  of  furnaces  too. 
And  the  oceans  and  the  continents,  as  you  know,  are  per- 
petual and  copious  contributors,  either  to  the  heating 
apparatus  or  to  the  contents  of  the  pot.  Let  grander 
similes  be  sought.  This  one  fits  for  the  smoky  receptacle 
cherishing  millions,  magnetic  to  tens  of  millions  more,  with 
its  caked  outside  of  grime,  and  the  inward  substance  inces- 
santly kicking  the  lid,  prankish,  but  never  casting  it  off. 
A  good  stew,  you  perceive;  not  a  parlous  boiling.     Weak 


"THE   PEINCESS   EGERIA"  161 

as  we  may  be  in  our  domestic  cookery,  our  political  has 
been  sagaciously  adjusted  as  yet  to  catch  the  ardours  of  the 
furnace  without  being  subject  to  their  volcanic  activities. 

That  the  social  is  also  somewhat  at  fault,  we  have  proof 
in  occasional  outcries  over  the  absence  of  these  or  those  par- 
ticular persons  famous  for  inspiriting.     It  sticks  and  clogs. 
The  improvizing  songster  is  missed,  the  convivial  essayist, 
the  humorous  Dean,  the  travelled  cynic,  and  he,  the  one  of 
his  day,  the  iridescent  Irishman,  whose  remembered  rep- 
artees are  a  feast,  sharp  and  ringing,  at  divers  tables  de- 
scending from  the  upper  to  the  fat  citizen's,  where,  instead 
of  coming  in  the  sequence  of  talk,  they  are  exposed   by 
blasting,  like  fossil  teeth  of  old  Deluge  sharks  in  monoto- 
nous walls  of  our  chalk-quarries.     Nor  are  these  the  less 
welcome  for  the  violence  of  their   introduction  among  a 
people  glad  to  be  set  burning  rather  briskly  awhile  by  the 
most  unexpected  of  digs  in  the  ribs.     Dan  Merion,  to  give 
an  example.     That  was  Dan  Merion's  joke  with  the  watch- 
man :  and  he  said  that  other  thing  to  the  Marquis  of  Kings- 
bury, when  the  latter  asked  him  if  he  had  ever  won  a 
donkey-race.     And  old  Dan  is  dead,  and  we  are  the  duller 
for  it !  which  leads  to  the  question  :  Is  genius  hereditary  ? 
And  the  affirmative  and  negative  are  respectively  main- 
tained, rather  against  the  Yes  in  the  dispute,  until  a  mem- 
ber of  the  audience  speaks  of  Dan  Merion's  having  left  a 
daughter  reputed  for  a  sparkling  wit  not  much  below  the 
level  of  his  own.     Why,  are  you  unaware  that  the   Mrs. 
Warwick  of  that  scandal  case  of  Warwick  versus  Dannis- 
burgh  was  old  Dan  Merion's  girl  and  his  only  child  ?     It  is 
true ;  for  a  friend  had  it  from  a  man  who  had  it  straight 
from  Mr.  Braddock,  of  the  firm  of  Braddock,  Thorpe,  and 
Simnel,  her  solicitors  in  the  action,  who  told  him  he  could 
sit  listening  to  her  for  hours,  and  that  she  was  as  innocent 
as  day ;  a  wonderful  combination  of  a  good  woman  and  a 
clever  woman  and  a  real  beauty.     Only  her  misfortune  was 
to  have  a  furiously  jealous  husband,  and  they  say  he  went 
mad  after  hearing  the  verdict. 

Diana  was  talked  of  in  the  London  circles.  A  witty 
woman  is  such  salt  that  where  she  has  once  been  tasted  she 
must  perforce  be  missed  more  than  any  of  the  absent,  the 
dowering  heavens  not  having  yet  showered  her  like  very 

11 


162  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

plentifully  upon  us.  Then  it  was  first  heard  that  Percy 
Dacier  had  been  travelling  with  her.  Miss  Asper  heard  of 
it.  Her  uncle,  Mr.  Quintin  Manx,  the  millionnaire,  was  an 
acquaintance  of  the  new  Judge  and  titled  dignitary,  Sir 
Craraborne  Wathin,  and  she  visited  Lady  Wathin,  at  whose 
table  the  report  in  the  journals  of  the  Nile-boat  party  was 
mentioned.  Lady  Wathin's  table  could  dispense  with  witty 
women,  and,  for  that  matter,  witty  men.  The  intrusion  of 
the  spontaneous  on  the  stereotyped  would  have  clashed. 
She  preferred,  as  hostess,  the  old  legal  anecdotes  sure  of 
their  laugh,  and  the  citations  from  the  manufactories  of 
fun  in  the  Press,  which  were  current  and  instantly  intel- 
ligible to  all  her  guests.  She  smiled  suavely  on  an  im- 
promptu pun,  because  her  experience  of  the  humorous 
appreciation  of  it  by  her  guests  bade  her  welcome  the  up- 
start. Nothing  else  impromptu  was  acceptable.  Mrs. 
Warwick  therefore  was  not  missed  by  Lady  Wathin.  "  I 
have  met  her,"  she  said.  "  I  confess  I  am  not  one  of  the 
fanatics  about  Mrs.  Warwick.  She  has  a  sort  of  skill  in 
getting  men  to  clamour.  If  you  stoop  to  tickle  them,  they 
will  applaud.  It  is  a  way  of  winning  a  reputation."  When 
the  ladies  were  separated  from  the  gentlemen  by  the  stream 
of  Claret,  Miss  Asper  heard  Lady  Wathin  speak  of  Mrs. 
Warwick  again.  An  illusion  to  Lord  Dannisburgh's  fit  of 
illness  in  the  House  of  Lords  led  to  her  saying  that  there 
was  no  doubt  he  had  been  fascinated,  and  that,  in  her 
opinion,  Mrs.  Warwick  was  a  dangerous  woman.  Sir 
Cramborne  knew  something  of  Mr.  Warwick :  "  Poor 
man  ! "  she  added.  A  lady  present  put  a  question  concern- 
ing Mrs.  Warwick's  beauty.  "Yes,"  Lady  Wathin  said, 
"  she  has  good  looks  to  aid  her.  Judging  from  what  I  hear 
and  have  seen,  her  thirst  is  for  notoriety.  Sooner  or  later 
we  shall  have  her  making  a  noise,  you  may  be  certain. 
Yes,  she  has  the  secret  of  dressing  well  —  in  the  French 
style." 

A  simple  newspaper  report  of  the  expedition  of  a  Nile- 
boat  party  could  stir  the  Powers  to  take  her  up  and  turn 
her  on  their  wheel  in  this  manner. 

But  others  of  the  sons  and  daughters  of  London  were 
regretting  her  prolonged  absence.  The  great  and  exclusive 
Whitmonby,  who  had  dined  once  at  Lady  Wathin's  table, 


"THE  PRINCESS   EGERIA  "  163 

and  vowed  never  more  to  repeat  that  offence  to  his  patience, 
lamented  bitterly  to  Henry  Wilmers  that  the  sole  woman 
worthy  of  sitting  at  a  little  Sunday  evening  dinner  with 
the  cream  of  the  choicest  men  of  the  time  was  away  wast- 
ing herself  in  that  insane  modern  chase  of  the  picturesque ! 
He  called  her  a  perverted  Celimene. 

Eed worth  had  less  to  regret  than  the  rest  of  her  male 
friends,  as  he  was  receiving  at  intervals  pleasant  descrip- 
tive letters,  besides  manuscript  sheets  of  Antonia's  new 
piece  of  composition,  to  correct  the  proofs  for  the  press, 
and  he  read  them  critically,  he  thought.  He  read  them 
with  a  watchful  eye  to  guard  them  from  the  critics.  An- 
ToxiA,  whatever  her  faults  as  a  writer,  was  not  one  of  the 
order  whose  Muse  is  the  Public  Taste.  She  did  at  least 
draw  her  inspiration  from  herself,  and  there  was  much  to 
be  feared  in  her  work,  if  a  sale  was  the  object.  Otherwise 
Kedworth's  highly  critical  perusal  led  him  flatly  to  admire. 
This  was  like  her,  and  that  was  like  her,  and  here  and 
there  a  phrase  gave  him  the  very  play  of  her  mouth,  the 
flash  of  her  eyes.  Could  he  possibly  wish,  or  bear,  to  have 
anything  altered  ?  But  she  had  reason  to  desire  an  ex- 
tended' sale  of  the  work.  Her  aim,  in  the  teeth  of  her  in- 
dependent style,  was  at  the  means  of  independence  —  a 
feminine  method  of  attempting  to  conciliate  contraries ; 
and  after  despatching  the  last  sheets  to  the  printer,  he 
meditated  upon  the  several  ways  which  might  serve  to  as- 
sist her ;  the  main  way  running  thus  in  his  mind :  —  We 
have  a  work  of  genius.  Genius  is  good  for  the  public. 
What  is  good  for  the  public  should  be  recommended  by  the 
critics.  It  should  be.  How  then  to  come  at  them  to  get  it 
done  ?  As  he  was  not  a  member  of  the  honourable  literary 
craft,  and  regarded  its  arcana  altogether  externally,  it  may 
be  confessed  of  him  that  he  deemed  the  Incorruptible  cor- 
ruptible;— ^not,  of  course,  with  filthy  coin  slid  into  sticky 
palms.  Critics  are  human,  and  exceedingly,  beyond  the 
common  lot,  when  touched ;  and  they  are  excited  by  mys- 
terious hints  of  loftiness  in  authorship;  by  rumours  of 
veiled  loveliness ;  whispers  of  a  general  anticipation ;  and 
also  Editors  can  jog  them.  Redworth  was  rising  to  be  a 
Railway  King  of  a  period  soon  to  glitter  with  rails,  iron  in 
the  concrete,  golden  in  the  visionary.     He  had  already  his 


164  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Court,  much  against  his  will.  The  powerful  magnetic  at- 
tractions of  those  who  can  help  the  world  to  fortune,  was 
exercised  by  him  in  spite  of  his  disgust  of  sycophants.  He 
dropped  words  to  right  and  left  of  a  coming  work  by  An- 
TONiA.  And  who  was  Antonia  ?  —  Ah  !  there  hung  the 
riddle.  —  An  exalted  personage  ?  —  So  much  so  that  he 
dared  not  name  her  even  in  confidence  to  ladies ;  he  named 
the  publishers.  To  men  he  said  he  was  at  liberty  to  speak 
of  her  only  as  the  most  beautiful  woman  of  her  time.  His 
courtiers  of  both  sexes  were  recommended  to  read  the  new 
story,  The  Princess  Egeria. 

Oddly,  one  great  lady  of  his  Court  had  heard  a  forthcom- 
ing work  of  this  title  spoken  of  by  Percy  Dacier,  not  a  man 
to  read  silly  fiction,  unless  there  was  meaning  behind  the 
lines  :  tbat  is,  rich  scandal  of  the  aristocracy,  diversified  by 
stinging  epigrams  to  the  address  of  discernible  personages. 
She  talked  of  The  Princess  Egeria  :  nay,  laid  her  finger 
on  the  identical  Princess.  Others  followed  her.  Dozens 
were  soon  flying  with  the  torch  :  a  new  work  immediately 
to  be  published  from  the  pen  of  the  Duchess  of  Stars !  — 
And  the  Princess  who  lends  her  title  to  the  book  is  a  living 
portrait  of  the  Princess  of  Highest  Eminence,  the  Hope 
of  all  Civilization.  —  Orders  for  copies  of  The  Princess 
Egeria  reached  the  astonished  publishers  before  the  book 
was  advertized. 

Speaking  to  editors,  Eedworth  complimented  them  with 
friendly  intimations  of  the  real  authorship  of  the  remark- 
able work  appearing.  He  used  a  certain  penetrative  mild- 
ness of  tone  in  saying  that  *'he  hoped  the  book  would 
succeed  :  "  it  deserved  to;  it  was  original;  but  the  original- 
ity might  tell  against  it.  All  would  depend  upon  a  favour- 
able launching  of  such  a  book.  "  Mrs.  Warwick  ?  Mrs. 
Warwick  ?  "  said  the  most  influential  of  editors,  Mr.  Marcus 
Tonans ;  "what!  that  singularly  handsome  woman?  .  .  . 
The  Dannisburgh  affair  ?  .  .  .  She 's  Whitmonby's  hero- 
ine. If  she  writes  as  cleverly  as  she  talks,  her  work  is 
worth  trumpeting."  He  promised  to  see  that  it  went  into 
good  hands  for  the  review,  and  a  prompt  review  —  an  es- 
sential point ;  none  of  your  long  digestions  of  the  contents. 

Diana's  indefatigable  friend  had  fair  assurances  that  her 
book  would  be  noticed  before  it  dropped  dead  to  the  public 


"THE  PRINCESS   EGERIA  "  165 

appetite  for  novelty.  He  was  anxious  next,  notwithstand- 
ing his  admiration  of  the  originality  of  the  conception  and 
the  cleverness  of  the  writing,  lest  the  Literary  Reviews 
should  fail  "to  do  it  justice:"  he  used  the  term;  for  if 
they  wounded  her,  they  would  take  the  pleasure  out  of  suc- 
cess ;  and  he  had  always  present  to  him  that  picture  of  the 
beloved  woman  kneeling  at  the  iire-grate  at  The  Crossways, 
which  made  the  thought  of  her  suffering  any  wound  his 
personal  anguish,  so  crucially  sweet  and  saintly  had  her 
image  then  been  stamped  on  him.  He  bethought  him,  in 
consequence,  while  sitting  in  the  House  of  Commons,  en- 
gaged upon  the  affairs  of  the  nation,  and  honestly  engaged, 
for  he  was  a  vigilant  worker  —  that  the  Irish  Secretary, 
Charles  Rainer,  with  whom  he  stood  in  amicable  relations, 
had  an  interest,  to  the  extent  of  reputed  ownership,  in  the 
chief  of  the  Literary  Reviews.  He  saw  Rainer  on  the 
benches,  and  marked  him  to  speak  to  him.  Looking  for 
him  shortly  afterward,  the  man  was  gone.  "Off  to  the 
Opera,  if  he  's  not  too  late  for  the  drop,"  a  neighbour  said, 
smiling  queerly,  as  though  he  ought  to  know;  and  then 
Redworth  recollected  current  stories  of  Rainer's  fantastical 
devotion  to  the  popular  prima  donna  of  the  angelical  voice. 
He  hurried  to  the  Opera  and  met  the  vomit,  and  heard  in 
the  crush-room  how  divine  she  had  been  that  night.  A 
fellow  member  of  the  House,  tolerably  intimate  with  Rainer, 
informed  him,  between  frightful  stomachic  roulades  of  her 
final  aria,  of  the  likeliest  place  where  Rainer  might  be 
found  when  the  Opera  was  over :  not  at  his  Club,  nor  at 
his  chambers :  on  one  of  the  bridges  —  Westminster,  he 
fancied. 

There  was  no  need  for  Redworth  to  run  hunting  the  man 
at  so  late  an  hour,  but  he  was  drawn  on  by  the  similarity 
in  dissimilarity  of  this  devotee  of  a  woman,  who  could  wor- 
ship her  at  a  distance,  and  talk  of  her  to  everybody.  Not 
till  he  beheld  Rainer's  tall  figure  cutting  the  bridge-parapet, 
with  a  star  over  his  shoulder,  did  he  reflect  on  the  views 
the  other  might  entertain  of  the  nocturnal  solicitation  to 
see  "  justice  done  "  to  a  lady's  new  book  in  a  particular  Re- 
view, and  the  absurd  outside  of  the  request  was  immedi- 
ately smothered  by  the  natural  simplicity  and  pressing 
necessity  of  its  inside. 


166  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

He  crossed  the  road  and  said,  "  Ah  ? "  in  recognition, 
"  Were  you  at  the  Opera  this  evening  ?  " 

"  Oh,  just  at  the  end/'  said  Rainer,  pacing  forward. 
"  It 's  a  fine  night.     Did  you  hear  her  ?  " 

"  No  ;  too  late." 

Rainer  pressed  ahead,  to  meditate  by  himself,  as  was  his 
wont.  Finding  Redworth  beside  him,  he  monologuized  in 
his  depths  :  "  They  '11  kill  her.  She  puts  her  soul  into  it, 
gives  her  blood.  There  's  no  failing  of  the  voice.  You 
see  how  it  wears  her.  She 's  doomed.  Half  a  year's  rest 
on  Como  .  .  .  somewhere  .  .  .  she  might  be  saved !  She 
won't  refuse  to  work." 

"  Have  you  spoken  to  her  ?  "  said  Eedworth. 

*^  And  next  to  Berlin  !  Vienna !     A  horse  would  be 

I  ?  I  don't  know  her,"  Kainer  replied.  "  Some  of  their 
women  stand  it.  She  's  delicately  built.  You  can't  treat 
a  lute  like  a  drum  without  destroying  the  instrument.  We 
look  on  at  a  murder  ! " 

The  haggard  prospect  from  that  step  of  the  climax 
checked  his  delivery. 

Red  worth  knew  him  to  be  a  sober  man  in  office,  a  man 
with  a  head  for  statecraft :  he  had  made  a  weighty  speech 
in  the  House  a  couple  of  hours  back.  This  Opera  cantatrice, 
no  beauty,  though  gentle,  thrilling,  winning,  was  his  corner 
of  romance. 

"  Do  you  come  here  often  ?  "  he  asked. 

"  Yes,  I  can't  sleep." 

*^  London  at  night,  from  the  bridge,  looks  fine.  By  the 
way  ..." 

''  It 's  lonely  here,  that 's  the  advantage,"  said  Rainer ;  "  I 
keep  silver  in  my  pocket  for  poor  girls  going  to  their 
homes,  and  I  'm  left  in  peace.  An  hour  later  there 's  the 
dawn  down  yonder." 

"  By  the  way,"  Redworth  interposed,  and  was  told  that 
after  these  nights  of  her  singing  she  never  slept  till 
morning.  He  swallowed  the  fact,  sympathized,  and  resumed : 
"I  want  a  small  favour." 

"  No  business  here,  please  I  " 

"  Not  a  bit  of  it.  You  know  Mrs.  Warwick.  .  .  .  You 
know  of  her.  She's  publishing  a  book.  I  want  you  to 
use  your  influence  to  get  it  noticed  quickly,  if  you  can." 


"THE    PRINCESS  EGERIA  "  167 

"  Warwick  ?  Oh,  yes,  a  handsome  woman.  Ah,  yes ; 
the  Dannisburgh  affair,  yes.  What  did  I  hear !  —  They 
say  she  's  thick  with  Percy  Dacier  at  present.  Who  was 
talking  of  her!  Yes,  old  Lady  Dacier.  So  she  's  a  friend 
of  yours  ?  " 

"  She 's  an  old  friend,"  said  Eedworth,  composing  himself ; 
for  the  dose  he  had  taken  was  not  of  the  sweetest,  and  no 
protestations  could  be  uttered  by  a  man  of  the  world  to 
repel  a  charge  of  tattlers.  "  The  truth  is,  her  book  is  clever. 
I  have  read  the  proofs.  She  must  have  an  income,  and  she 
won't  apply  to  her  husband,  and  literature  should  help  her, 
if  she 's  fairly  treated.  She 's  Irish  by  descent;  Merion's 
daughter,  witty  as  her  father.  It 's  odd  you  have  n't  met 
her.  The  mere  writing  of  the  book  is  extraordinarily  good. 
If  it 's  put  into  capable  hands  for  review !  that 's  all  it 
requires.  And  full  of  life  .  .  .  bright  dialogue  ... 
capital  sketches.  The  book 's  a  piece  of  literature.  Only 
it  must  have  competent  critics !  " 

So  he  talked  while  Eainer  ejaculated :  ^'  Warwick  ? 
Warwick  ? "  in  the  irritating  tone  of  dozens  of  others. 
*^  What  did  I  hear  of  her  husband  ?  He  has  a  post.  .  .  . 
Yes,  yes.  Some  one  said  the  verdict  in  that  case  knocked 
him  over  —  heart  disease,  or  something." 

He  glanced  at  the  dark  Thames  water.  '^Take  my  word 
for  it,  the  groves  of  Academe  won't  compare  with  one  of 
our  bridges  at  night,  if  you  seek  philosophy.  You  see  the 
London  above  and  the  London  below :  round  us  the  sleepy 
city,  and  the  stars  in  the  water  looking  like  souls  of  suicides. 
I  caught  a  girl  with  a  bad  fit  on  her  once.  I  had  to  lecture 
her!  It 's  when  we  become  parsons  we  find  out  our  cousin- 
ship  with  these  poor  peripatetics,  whose  'last  philosophy' 
is  a  jump  across  the  parapet.  The  bridge  at  night  is  a  bath 
for  a  public  man.     But  choose  another  ;  leave  me  mine." 

Eedworth  took  the  hint.  He  stated  the  title  of  Mrs. 
Warwick's  book,  and  imagined  from  the  thoughtful  cast 
of  Eainer's  head,  that  he  was  impressing  The  Princess 
Egeria  on  his  memory. 

Eainer  burst  out,  with  clenched  fists:  "He  beats  her! 
The  fellow  lives  on  her  and  beats  her;  strikes  that  woman! 
He  drags  her  about  to  every  Capital  in  Europe  to  make 
money  for  him,  and  the  scoundrel  pays  her  with  blows." 


168  DIANA  OF  THE  CBOSSWAYS 

In  the  course  of  a  heavy  tirade  against  the  scoundrel, 
Redworth  apprehended  that  it  was  the  cantatrice's  hus- 
band. He  expressed  his  horror  and  regret ;  paused,  and 
named  The  Princess  Egeria  and  a  certain  Critical  Ee- 
view.  Another  outburst  seemed  to  be  in  preparation. 
Nothing  further  was  to  be  done  for  the  book  at  that  hour. 
So,  with  a  blunt  "  Good  night,"  he  left  Charles  Eainer 
pacing,  and  thought  on  his  walk  home  of  the  strange  effects 
wrought  by  women  unwittingly  upon  men  (Englishmen) ; 
those  women,  or  some  of  them,  as  little  knowing  it  as  the 
moon  her  traditional  influence  upon  the  tides.  He  thought 
of  Percy  Dacier  too.  In  his  bed  he  could  have  wished 
himself  peregrinating  a  bridge. 

The  Princess  Egeria  appeared,  with  the  reviews  at  her 
heels,  a  pack  of  clappers,  causing  her  to  fly  over  editions 
clean  as  a  doe  the  gates  and  hedges  —  to  quote  Mr.  Sullivan 
Smith,  who  knew  not  a  sentence  of  the  work  save  what  he 
gathered  of  it  from  Kedworth,  at  their  chance  meeting  on 
Piccadilly  pavement,  and  then  immediately  he  knew  enough 
to  blow  his  huntsman's  horn  in  honour  of  the  sale.  His 
hallali  rang  high.  "  Here 's  another  Irish  girl  to  win  their 
laurels !  'T  is  one  of  the  blazing  successes.  A  most  en- 
thralling work,  beautifully  composed.  And  where  is  she 
now,  Mr.  Eedworth,  since  she  broke  away  from  that  hus- 
band of  hers,  that  wears  the  clothes  of  the  worst  tailor  ever 
begotten  by  a  thread  on  a  needle,  as  I  tell  every  soul  of  'em 
in  my  part  of  the  country  ?  " 

"  You  have  seen  him  ?  "  said  Eedworth. 

"Why,  sir,  wasn't  he  on  show  at  the  Court  he  applied  to 
for  relief  and  damages  ?  as  we  heard  when  we  were  watch- 
ing the  case  daily,  scarce  drawing  our  breath  for  fear  the 
innocent  —  and  one  of  our  own  blood,  would  be  crushed. 
Sure,  there  he  stood ;  ay,  and  looking  the  very  donkey  for 
a  woman  to  flip  off  her  fingers,  like  the  dust  from  my  great 
uncle's  prise  of  snuff !  She 's  a  glory  to  the  old  country. 
And  better  you  than  another,  I  'd  say,  since  it  was  n't  an 
Irishman  to  have  her :  but  what  induced  the  dear  lady  to 
take  Aim,  is  the  question  we  're  all  of  us  asking  !  And  it 's 
mournful  to  think  that  somehow  you  contrive  to  get  the 
pick  of  us  in  the  girls  !  If  ever  we  're  united,  't  will  be  by 
a  trick  of  circumvention  of  that  sort,  pretty  sure.     There 's 


"THE  PRINCESS  EGERIA  "  169 

a  turn  in  the  market  when  they  shut  their  eyes  and  drop 
to  the  handiest :  and  London 's  a  vortex  that  poor  dear  dull 
old  Dublin  can't  compete  with.  I'll  beg  you  for  the  ad- 
dress of  the  lady  her  friend,  Lady  Dunstane." 

Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  walked  with  Kedworth  through  the 
park  to  the  House  of  Commons,  discoursing  of  Rails  and 
his  excellent  old  friend's  rise  to  the  top  rung  of  the  ladder 
and  Beanstalk  land,  so  elevated  that  one  had  to  look  up  at 
him  with  watery  eyes,  as  if  one  had  flung  a  ball  at  the 
meridian  sun.  Arrived  at  famed  St.  Stephen's,  he  sent  in 
his  compliments  to  the  noble  patriot  and  accepted  an 
invitation  to  dinner. 

"And  mind  you  read  The  Princess  Egeria,"  said 
Redworth. 

"Again  and  again,  my  friend.  The  book  is  bought." 
Sullivan  Smith  slapped  his  breastpocket. 

"There  's  a  bit  of  Erin  in  it." 

"  It  sprouts  from  Erin." 

"Trumpet  it." 

"Loud  as  cavalry  to  the  charge ! " 

Once  with  the  title  stamped  on  his  memory,  the  zealous 
Irishman  might  be  trusted  to  become  an  ambulant  adver- 
tizer.  Others,  personal  friends,  adherents,  courtiers  of  Red- 
worth's,  were  active.  Lady  Pennon  and  Henry  Wilmers, 
in  the  upper  circle ;  Whitmonby  and  Westlake,  in  the 
literary,  —  spread  the  fever  for  this  new  book.  The  chief 
interpreter  of  public  opinion  caught  the  way  of  the  wind 
and  headed  the  gale. 

Editions  of  the  book  did  really  run  like  fires  in  summer 
furze;  and  to  such  an  extent  that  a  simple  literary  per- 
formance grew  to  be  respected  in  Great  Britain,  as  repre- 
senting Money. 


170  DIANA  OF  O^HE  CKOSSWAYS 

CHAPTER  XVIII 

THE    AUTHORESS 

The  effect  of  a  great  success  upon  Diana,  at  her  second 
literary  venture,  was  shown  in  the  transparent  sedateness 
of  a  letter  she  wrote  to  Emma  Dunstane,  as  much  as  in  her 
immediate  and  complacent  acceptance  of  the  magical  change 
of  her  fortunes.  She  spoke  one  thing  and  acted  another, 
but  did  both  with  a  lofty  calm  that  deceived  the  admiring 
friend  who  clearly  saw  the  authoress  behind  her  mask,  and 
feared  lest  she  should  be  too  confidently  trusting  to  the 
powers  of  her  pen  to  support  an  establishment. 

^'  If  the  public  were  a  perfect  instrument  to  strike  on,  I, 
should  be  tempted  to  take  the  wonderful  success  of  my 
Princess  at  her  first  appearance  for  a  proof  of  natural 
aptitude  in  composition,  and  might  think  myself  the  genius. 
I  know  it  to  be  as  little  a  Stradivarius  as  I  am  a  Paganini. 
It  is  an  eccentric  machine,  in  tune  with  me  for  the  moment, 
because  I  happen  to  have  hit  it  in  the  ringing  spot.  The  book 
is  a  neiv  face  appealing  to  a  mirror  of  the  common  surface 
emotions  ;  and  the  kitchen  rather  than  the  dairy  offers  an 
analogy  for  the  real  value  of  that  ^  top-skim.'  I  have  not 
seen  what  I  consider  good  in  the  book  once  mentioned 
among  the  laudatory  notices  —  except  by  your  dear  hand,  my 
Emmy.  Be  sure  I  will  stand  on  guard  against  the  ^  vapor- 
ous generalizations,'  and  other  'tricks'  you  fear.  Now 
that  you  are  studying  Latin  for  an  occupation  —  how  good 
and  wise  it  was  of  Mr.  Eedworth  to  propose  it !  —  1  look 
upon  you  with  awe  as  a  classic  authority  and  critic.  I 
wish  I  had  leisure  to  study  with  you.  What  I  do  is  nothing 
iike  so  solid  and  durable. 

"  The  Princess  Egeria  originally  (I  must  have  written 
word  of  it  to  you  —  I  remember  the  evening  off  Palermo  !) 
was  conceived  as  a  sketch  ;  by  gradations  she  grew  into  a 
sort  of  semi-Scudery  romance,  and  swelled  to  her  present 
portliness.  That  was  done  by  a  great  deal  of  piecing,  not  to 
say  puffing,  of  her  frame.  She  would  be  healthier  and 
have  a  chance  of  living  longer  if  she  were  reduced  by  a 


THE  AUTHORESS  171 

reversal  of  the  processes.  But  how  would  the  judicious 
clippings  and  prickings  affect  our  *  pensive  public  '  ?  Now 
that  I  have  furnished  a  house  and  have  a  fixed  address, 
under  the  paws  of  creditors,  I  feel  I  am  in  the  wizard- 
circle  of  my  popularity  and  subscribe  to  its  laws  or  waken 
to  incubus  and  the  desert.  Have  I  been  rash?  You  do 
not  pronounce.  If  I  have  bound  myself  to  pipe  as  others 
please,  it  need  not  be  entirely  ;  and  I  can  promise  you  it 
shall  not  be ;  but  still  I  am  sensible  when  I  lift  my  '  little 
quill'  of  having  forced  the  note  of  a  woodland  wren  into 
the  popular  nightingale's  —  which  may  end  in  the  daw's, 
from  straining  ;  or  worse,  a  toy-whistle. 

"That  is,  in  the  field  of  literature.  Otherwise,  within 
me  deep,  I  am  not  aware  of  any  transmutation  of  the  celes- 
tial into  coined  gold.  I  sound  myself,  and  ring  clear.  In- 
cessant writing  is  my  refuge,  my  solace  —  escape  out  of  the 
personal  net.  I  delight  in  it,  as  in  my  early  morning  walks 
at  Lugano,  when  I  went  threading  the  streets  and  by  the 
lake  away  to  '  the  heavenly  mount,'  like  a  dim  idea  worming 
upward  in  a  sleepy  head  to  bright  wakefulness. 

"  My  anonymous  critic,  of  whom  I  told  you,  is  intoxi- 
cating with  eulogy.  The  signature  'Apollonius'  appears 
to  be  of  literary-middle  indication.  He  marks  passages  ap- 
proved by  you.  I  have  also  had  a  complimentary  letter 
from  Mr.  Dacier. 

"  For  an  instance  of  this  delight  I  have  in  writing,  so 
strong  is  it  that  I  can  read  pages  I  have  written,  and  tear 
the  stuff  to  strips  (I  did  yesterday),  and  resume,  as  if 
nothing  had  happened.  The  waves  within  are  ready  for  any 
displacement.  That  must  be  a  good  sign.  I  do  not  doubt 
of  excelling  my  Princess  ;  and  if  she  received  compli- 
ments, the  next  may  hope  for  more.  Consider,  too,  the 
novel  pleasure  of  earning  money  by  the  labour  we  delight 
in.  It  is  an  answer  to  your  question  whether  I  am  happy. 
Yes,  as  the  savage  islander  before  the  ship  entered  the 
bay  with  the  fire-water.  My  blood  is  wine,  and  I  have  the 
slumbers  of  an  infant.  I  dream,  wake,  forget  my  dream, 
barely  dress  before  the  pen  is  galloping ;  barely  breakfast ; 
no  toilette  till  noon.  A  savage  in  good  sooth !  You  see,  my 
Emmy,  I  could  not  house  with  the  '  companionable  person ' 
you  hint  at.     The  poles  can  never  come  together  till  the 


172  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

earth  is  crushed.  She  would  find  ray  habits  intolerable, 
and  I  hers  contemptible,  though  we  might  both  be  compan- 
ionable persons.  My  dear,  I  could  not  even  live  with  my- 
self. My  blessed  little  quill,  which  helps  me  divinely  to 
live  out  of  myself,  is  and  must  continue  to  be  my  one  com- 
panion. It  is  my  mountain  height,  morning  light,  wings, 
cup  from  the  springs,  my  horse,  my  goal,  my  lancet  and 
replenisher,  my  key  of  communication  with  the  highest, 
grandest,  holiest  between  earth  and  heaven  —  the  vital  air 
connecting  them. 

"In  justice  let  me  add  that  I  have  not  been  troubled  by 
hearing  of  any  of  the  mysterious  legal  claims,  et  caetera. 
I  am  sorry  to  hear  bad  reports  of  health.  I  wish  him  en- 
tire felicity  —  no  step  taken  to  bridge  division  !  The 
thought  of  it  makes  me  tigrish. 

"A  new  pianist  playing  his  own  pieces  (at  Lady  Sin- 
gleby's  concert)  has  given  me  exquisite  pleasure  and  set 
me  composing  songs  —  not  to  his  music,  which  could  be 
rendered  only  by  sylphs  moving  to  *  soft  recorders  '  in  the 
humour  of  wildness,  languor,  bewitching  caprices,  giving 
a  new  sense  to  melody.  How  I  wish  you  had  been  with 
me  to  hear  him !  It  was  the  most  ^olian  thing  ever 
caught  from  a  night-breeze  by  the  soul  of  a  poet. 

"  But  do  not  suppose  me  having  headlong  tendencies  to 
the  melting  mood.  (The  above,  by  the  way,  is  a  Pole  set- 
tled in  Paris,  and  he  is  to  be  introduced  to  me  at  Lady 
Pennon's.)  — What  do  you  say  to  my  being  invited  by  Mr. 
Whitmonby  to  aid  him  in  writing  leading  articles  for  the 
paper  he  is  going  to  conduct !  ^  write  as  you  talk  and  it  will 
do,'  he  says.  I  am  choosing  my  themes.  To  write  —  of 
politics  —  as  I  talk,  seems  to  me  like  an  effort  to  jump 
away  from  my  shadow.  The  black  dog  of  consciousness 
declines  to  be  shaken  off.  If  some  one  commanded  me  to 
talk  as  I  write!  I  suspect  it  would  be  a  way  of  winding 
me  up  to  a  sharp  critical  pitch  rapidly. 

"  Not  good  news  of  Lord  D.  I  have  had  messages.  Mr. 
Dacier  conceals  his  alarm.  The  Princess  gave  great  grati- 
fication. ^  She  did  rae  her  best  service  there.  Is  it  not  cruel 
that  the  interdict  of  the  censor  should  force  me  to  depend 
for  information  upon  such  scraps  as  I  get  from  a  gentleman 
passing  my  habitation  ou  his  way  to  the  House  ?     And  he 


THE  AUTHORESS  173 

is  not,  he  never  has  been,  sympathetic  in  that  direction.  He 
sees  my  grief,  and  assumes  an  undertakerly  air,  with  some 
notion  of  acting  in  concert,  one  supposes  —  little  imagining 
how  I  revolt  from  that  crape-hatband  formalism  of  sorrow ! 

"  One  word  of  her  we  call  our  inner  T.  I  am  not  drawing 
upon  her  resources  for  my  daily  needs ;  not  wasting  her  at 
all,  I  trust;  certainly  not  walling  her  up,  to  deafen  her 
voice.  It  would  be  to  fall  away  from  you.  She  bids  me 
sign  myself,  my  beloved,  ever,  ever  your  Tony." 

The  letter  had  every  outward  show  of  sincereness  in  ex- 
pression, and  was  endowed  to  wear  that  appearance  by  the 
writer's  impulse  to  protest  with  so  resolute  a  vigour  as  to 
delude  herself.  Lady  Dunstane  heard  of  Mr.  Dacier's 
novel  attendance  at  concerts.  The  world  made  a  note  of 
it;  for  the  gentleman  was  notoriously  without  ear  for 
music. 

Diana's  comparison  of  her  hours  of  incessant  writing  to 
her  walks  under  the  dawn  at  Lugano,  her  boast  of  the  simi- 
larity of  her  delight  in  both,  deluded  her  uncorrupted  con- 
science to  believe  that  she  was  now  spiritually  as  free  as  in 
that  fair  season  of  the  new  spring  in  her  veins.  She  was 
not  an  investigating  physician,  nor  was  Lady  Dunstane, 
otherwise  they  would  have  examined  the  material  points 
of  her  conduct  —  indicators  of  the  spiritual  secret  always. 
What  are  the  patient's  acts  ?  The  patient's  mind  was  pro- 
jected too  far  beyond  them  to  see  the  forefinger  they 
stretched  at  her;  and  the  friend's  was  not  that  of  a  prying 
doctor  on  the  look  out  for  betraying  symptoms.  Lady  Dun- 
stane did  ask  herself  why  Tony  should  have  incurred  the 
burden  of  a  costly  household  —  a  very  costly :  Sir  Lukin 
had  been  at  one  of  Tony's  little  dinners  :  —  but  her  wish  to 
meet  the  world  on  equal  terms,  after  a  long  dependency, 
accounted  for  it  in  seeming  to  excuse.  The  guests  on  the 
occasion  were  Lady  Pennon,  Lady  Singleby,  Mr.  Whit- 
monby,  Mr.  Percy  Dacier,  Mr.  Tonans ;  — "  Some  other 
woman,"  Sir  Lukin  said,  and  himself.  He  reported  the 
cookery  as  matching  the  conversation,  and  that  was 
princely  ;  the  wines  not  less  :  an  extraordinary  fact  to  note 
of  a  woman.  But  to  hear  Whitmonby  and  Diana  Warwick  ! 
How  he  told  a  story,  neat  as  a  postman's  knock,  and  she 
tippe4  it  with  a  resaark  and  ran  to  a  second,  drawing  in 


174  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Lady  Pennon,  and  then  Dacier,  ^^  and  me ! "  cried  Sir 
Lukin ;  ^'  she  made  us  all  toss  the  ball  from  hand  to  hand, 
and  all  talk  up  to  the  mark ;  and  none  of  us  noticed  that  we 
all  went  together  to  the  drawing-room,  where  we  talked  for 
another  hour,  and  broke  up  fresher  than  we  began." 

"  That  break  between  the  men  and  the  women  after  din- 
ner was  Tony's  aversion,  and  I  am  glad  she  has  instituted 
a  change,"  said  Lady  Dunstane. 

She  heard  also  from  Kedworth  of  the  unexampled  con- 
cert of  the  guests  at  Mrs.  Warwick's  dinner  parties.  He 
had  met  on  one  occasion  the  Esquarts,  the  Pettigrews,  Mr. 
Percy  Dacier,  and  a  Miss  Paynham.  Kedworth  had  not 
a  word  to  say  of  the  expensive  household.  Whatever 
Mrs.  Warwick  did  was  evidently  good  to  him.  On  another 
evening  the  party  was  composed  of  Lady  Pennon,  Lord 
Larrian,  Miss  Paynham,  a  clever  Mrs.  Wollasley,  Mr.  Henry 
Wilmers,  and  again  Mr.  Percy  Dacier. 

When  Diana  came  to  Copsley,  Lady  Dunstane  remarked 
on  the  recurrence  of  the  name  of  Miss  Paynham  in  the  list 
of  her  guests. 

"And  Mr.  Percy  Dacier's  too,"  said  Diana,  smiling. 
''They  are  invited  each  for  specific  reasons.  It  pleases 
Lord  Dannisburgh  to  hear  that  a  way  has  been  found  to  en- 
liven his  nephew ;  and  my  little  dinners  are  effective,  I 
think.  He  wakes.  Yesterday  evening  he  capped  flying 
jests  with  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith.  But  you  speak  of  Miss 
Paynham."  Diana  lowered  her  voice  on  half  a  dozen  sylla- 
bles, till  the  half-tones  dropped  into  her  steady  look.  ^^  You 
approve,  Emmy  ?  " 

The  answer  was  :  "  I  do  —  true  or  not." 

'' Between  us  two,  dear,  I  fear!  ...  In  either  case,  she 
has  been  badly  used.  Society  is  big  engine  enough  to  pro- 
tect itself.  I  incline  with  British  juries  to  do  rough  justice 
to  the  victims.  She  has  neither  father  nor  brother.  I  have 
had  no  confidences  :  but  it  wears  the  look  of  a  cowardly  busi- 
ness. With  two  words  in  his  ear,  I  could  arm  an  Irishman 
to  do  some  work  of  chastisement :  —  he  would  select  the 
rascal's  necktie  for  a  cause  of  quarrel :  and  lords  have  to 
stand  their  ground  as  well  as  commoners.  They  measure 
the  same  number  of  feet  when  stretched  their  length. 
However,  vengeance  with  the  heavens !  though  they  seem 


THE  AUTHOKESS  175 

tardy.  Lady  Pennon  has  been  very  kind  about  it;  and  the 
Esquarts  invite  her  to  Lockton.  Shoulder  to  shoulder,  the 
tide  may  be  stemmed." 

"  She  would  have  gone  under,  but  for  you,  dear  Tony !  " 
said  Emma,  folding  arms  round  her  darling's  neck  and 
kissing  her.     "Bring  her  here  some  day." 

Diana  did  not  promise  it.  She  had  her  vision  of  Sir 
Lukin  in  his  fit  of  lunacy. 

"  I  am  too  weak  for  London  now,"  Emma  resumed.  "  I 
should  like  to  be  useful.     Is  she  pleasant  ?  " 

"  Sprightly  by  nature.  She  has  worn  herself  with 
fretting." 

"  Then  bring  her  to  stay  with  me,  if  I  cannot  keep  you. 
She  will  talk  of  you  to  me." 

"  I  will  bring  her  for  a  couple  of  days,"  Diana  said.  "  I 
am  too  busy  to  remain  longer.  She  paints  portraits  to 
amuse  herself.  She  ought  to  be  pushed,  wherever  she  is 
received  about  London,  while  the  season  is  warm.  One 
season  will  suffice  to  establish  her.  She  is  pretty,  near 
upon  six  and  twenty :  foolish,  of  course  :  she  pays  for 
having  had  a  romantic  head.  Heavy  payment,  Emmy  !  I 
drive  at  laws,  but  hers  is  an  instance  of  the  creatures 
wanting  simple  human  kindness." 

**The  good  law  will  come  with  a  better  civilization;  but 
before  society  can  be  civilized  it  has  to  be  debarbarized," 
Emma  remarked,  and  Diana  sighed  over  the  task  and  the 
truism. 

"  I  should  have  said  in  younger  days,  because  it  will  not 
look  plainly  on  our  nature  and  try  to  reconcile  it  with  our 
conditions.  But  now  I  see  that  the  sin  is  cowardice.  The 
more  I  know  of  the  world  the  more  clearly  I  perceive  that 
its  top  and  bottom  sin  is  cowardice,  physically  and  morally 
alike.  Lord  Larrian  owns  to  there  being  few  heroes  in  an 
army.  We  must  fawn  in  society.  What  is  the  meaning 
of  that  dread  of  one  example  of  tolerance  ?  0  my  dear ! 
let  us  give  it  the  right  name.  Society  is  the  best  thing  we 
have,  but  it  is  a  crazy  vessel  worked  by  a  crew  that  formerly 
practised  piracy,  and  now,  in  expiation,  professes  piety, 
fearful  of  a  discovered  Omnipotence,  which  is  in  the  image 
of  themselves  and  captain.  Their  old  habits  are  not  quite 
abandoned,  and  their  new  one  is  used  as  a  lash  to  whip  the 


176  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

exposed  of  us  for  a  propitiation  of  the  capricious  potentate 
whom  they  worship  in  the  place  of  the  true  God." 

Lady  Dunstane  sniffed.     "  I  smell  the  leading  article." 

Diana  joined  with  her  smile,  "No,  the  style  is  rather 
different." 

"  Have  you  not  got  into  a  trick  of  composing  in  speaking, 
at  times  ?  " 

Diana  confessed,  "  I  think  I  have  at  times.  Perhaps  the 
daily  writing  of  all  kinds  and  the  nightly  talking  ...  I 
may  be  getting  strained." 

"  No,  Tony ;  but  longer  visits  in  the  country  to  me  would 
refresh  you.  I  miss  your  lighter  touches.  London  is  a 
school,  but,  you  know  it,  not  a  school  for  comedy  nor  for 
philosophy;  that  is  gathered  on  my  hills,  with  London 
distantly  in  view,  and  then  occasional  descents  on  it  well 
digested." 

"I  wonder  whether  it  is  affecting  me!"  said  Diana, 
musing.  "  A  metropolitan  hack !  and  while  thinking  my- 
self free,  thrice  harnessed ;  and  all  my  fun  gone.  Am  I 
really  as  dull  as  a  tract,  my  dear  ?  I  must  be,  or  I  should 
be  proving  the  contrary  instead  of  asking.  My  pitfall  is 
to  fancy  I  have  powers  equal  to  the  first  look-out  of  the 
eyes  of  the  morning.  Enough  of  me.  We  talked  of  Mary 
Paynham.  If  only  some  right  good  man  would  marry 
her ! " 

Lady  Dunstane  guessed  at  the  right  good  man  in  Diana's 
mind.     "  Do  you  bring  them  together  ?  " 

Diana  nodded,  and  then  shook  doleful  negatives  to  signify 
no  hope. 

"None  whatever  —  if  we  mean  the  same  person,"  said 
Lady  Dunstane,  bethinking  her,  in  the  spirt  of  wrath  she 
felt  at  such  a  scheme  being  planned  by  Diana  to  snare  the 
right  good  man,  that  instead  of  her  own  true  lover  Eed- 
worth,  it  might  be  only  Percy  Dacier.  So  filmy  of  mere 
sensations  are  these  little  ideas  as  they  flit  in  converse,  that 
she  did  not  reflect  on  her  friend's  ignorance  of  Redworth's 
love  of  her,  or  on  the  unlikely  choice  of  one  in  Dacier's 
high  station  to  reinstate  a  damsel. 

They  did  not  name  the  person. 

"Passing  the  instance,  which  is  cruel,  I  will  be  just  to 
society  thus  far,"  said  Diana.     "'  I  was  in  a  boat  at  RIqIi- 


THE  AUTHORESS  177 

mond  last  week,  and  Leander  was  revelling  along  the 
mud-banks,  and  took  it  into  his  head  to  swim  out  to  me, 
and  I  was  moved  to  take  him  on  board.  The  ladies  in  the 
boat  objected,  for  he  was  not  only  wet  but  very  muddy.  I 
was  forced  to  own  that  their  objections  were  reasonable. 
My  sentimental  humaneness  had  no  argument  against 
muslin  dresses,  though  my  dear  dog's  eyes  appealed 
pathetically,  and  he  would  keep  swimming  after  us.  The 
analogy  excuses  the  world  for  protecting  itself  in  extreme 
cases ;  nothing,  nothing  excuses  its  insensibility  to  cases 
which  may  be  pleaded.  You  see  the  pirate  crew  turned 
pious  —  ferocious  in  sanctity."  She  added,  half  laughing : 
"  I  am  reminded  by  the  boat,  I  have  unveiled  my  anonymous 
critic,  and  had  a  woeful  disappointment.  He  wrote  like  a 
veteran ;  he  is  not  much  more  than  a  boy.  I  received  a 
volume  of  verse,  and  a  few  lines  begging  my  acceptance.  I 
fancied  I  knew  the  writing,  and  wrote  asking  him  whether 
I  had  not  to  thank  him,  and  inviting  him  to  call.  He  seems 
a  nice  lad  of  about  two  and  twenty,  mad  for  literature ;  and 
he  must  have  talent.  Arthur  Rhodes  by  name.  I  may 
have  a  chance  of  helping  him.  He  was  an  articled  clerk 
of  Mr.  Braddock's,  the  same  who  valiantly  came  to  my 
rescue  once.     He  was  with  us  in  the  boat." 

"  Bring  him  to  me  some  day,"  said  Lady  Dunstane. 

Miss  Paynham's  visit  to  Copsley  was  arranged,  and  it 
turned  out  a  failure.  The  poor  young  lady  came  in  a 
flutter,  thinking  that  the  friend  of  Mrs.  Warwick  would 
expect  her  to  discourse  cleverly.  She  attempted  it,  to 
Diana's  amazement.  Lady  Dunstane's  opposingly  corre- 
sponding stillness  provoked  Miss  Paynham  to  expatiate, 
for  she  had  sprightliness  and  some  mental  reserves  of  the 
common  order.  Clearly,  Lady  Dunstane  mused  while 
listening  amiably,  Tony  never  could  have  designed  this 
gnbbler  for  the  mate  of  Thomas  Eedworth  ! 

Percy  Dacier  seemed  to  her  the  more  likely  one,  in  that 
light,  and  she  thought  so  still,  after  Sir  Lukin  had  intro- 
duced him  at  Copsley  for  a  couple  of  days  of  the  hunting 
season.  Tony's  manner  with  him  suggested  it ;  she  had  a 
dash  of  leadership.  They  were  not  intimate  in  look  or 
tongue. 

But  Percy  Dacier  also  was  too  good  for  Miss  Paynham, 

12 


178  DIANA  OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

if  that  was  Tony's  plan  for  him,  Lady  Dunstane  thought, 
with  the  relentlessness  of  an  invalid  and  recluse's  distaste. 
An  aspect  of  penitence  she  had  not  demanded,  but  the  silly 
gabbler  under  a  stigma  she  could  not  pardon. 

Her  opinion  of  Miss  Paynham  was  diffused  in  her 
silence. 

Speaking  of  Mr.  Dacier,  she  remarked,  "  As  you  say  of 
him,  Tony,  he  can  brighten,  and  when  you  give  him  a 
chance  he  is  entertaining.  He  has  fine  gifts.  If  I  were  a 
member  of  his  family  I  should  beat  about  for  a  match  for 
him.  He  strikes  me  as  one  of  the  young  men  who  would 
do  better  married." 

"  He  is  doing  very  well,  but  the  wonder  is  that  he  does  n't 
marry,"  said  Diana.  "He  ought  to  be  engaged.  Lady 
Esquart  told  me  that  he  was.  A  Miss  Asper  —  great 
heiress;  and  the  Daciers  want  money.  However,  there 
it  is." 

Not  many  weeks  later  Diana  could  not  have  spoken  of 
Mr.  Percy  Dacier  with  this  air  of  indifference  without 
corruption  of  her  inward  guide. 


CHAPTER  XIX 

A   DRIVE    IN   SUNLIGHT    AND    A    DRIVE    IN    MOONLIGHT 

The  fatal  time  to  come  for  her  was  in  the  Summer  of  that 
year. 

Emma  had  written  her  a  letter  of  unwonted  bright 
spirits,  contrasting  strangely  with  an  inexplicable  oppres- 
sion of  her  own  that  led  her  to  imagine  her  recent  placid 
life  the  pause  before  thunder,  and  to  share  the  mood  of  her 
solitary  friend  she  flew  to  Copsley,  finding  Sir  Lukin 
absent,  as  usual.  They  drove  out  immediately  after  break- 
fast, on  one  of  those  high  mornings  of  the  bared  bosom  of 
June  when  distances  are  given  to  our  eyes,  and  a  soft  air 
fondles  leaf  and  grassblade,  and  beauty  and  peace  are  over- 
head, reflected,  if  we  will.  Rain  had  fallen  in  the  night. 
Here  and  there  hung  a  milkwhite  cloud  with  folded  sail. 


SUNLIGHT  AND  MOONLIGHT  DRIVES  179 

The  South-west  left  it  in  its  bay  of  blue,  and  breathed 
below.  At  moments  the  fresh  scent  of  herb  and  mould 
swung  richly  in  warmth.  The  young  beech-leaves  glittered, 
pools  of  rain-water  made  the  roadways  laugh,  the  grass- 
banks  under  hedges  rolled  their  interwoven  weeds  in 
cascades  of  many-shaded  green  to  right  and  left  of  the  pair 
of  dappled  ponies,  and  a  squirrel  crossed  ahead,  a  lark  went 
up  a  little  way  to  ease  his  heart,  closing  his  wings  when 
the  burst  was  over,  startled  black-birds,  darting  with  a 
clamour  like  a  broken  cockcrow,  looped  the  wayside  woods 
from  hazel  to  oak-scrub ;  short  flights,  quick  spirts  every- 
where, steady  sunshine  above. 

Diana  held  the  reins.  The  whip  was  an  ornament,  as 
the  plume  of  feathers  to  the  general  officer.  Lady  Dun- 
5tane's  ponies  were  a  present  from  Redworth,  who  always 
chose  the  pick  of  the  land  for  his  gifts.  They  joyed  in 
their  trot,  and  were  the  very  love-birds  of  the  breed  for 
their  pleasure  of  going  together,  so  like  that  Diana  called 
them  the  Dromios.  Through  an  old  gravel-cutting  a  gate- 
way led  to  the  turf  of  the  down,  springy  turf  bordered  on  a 
long  line,  clear  as  a  racecourse,  by  golden  gorse  covers,  and 
leftward  over  the  gorse  the  dark  ridge  of  the  fir  and  heath 
country  ran  companionably  to  the  South-west,  the  valley 
between,  with  undulations  of  wood  and  meadow  sunned  or 
shaded,  clumps,  mounds,  promontories,  away  to  broad 
spaces  of  tillage  banked  by  wooded  hills,  and  dimmer  be- 
3^ond  and  farther,  the  faintest  shadowiness  of  heights,  as  a 
veil  to  the  illimitable.  Yews,  junipers,  radiant  beeches, 
and  gleams  of  the  service-tree  or  the  white-beam  spotted 
the  semicircle  of  swelling  green  Down  black  and  silver. 
The  sun  in  the  valley  sharpened  his  beams  on  squares  of 
buttercups,  and  made  a  pond  a  diamond. 

"  You  see,  Tony,"  Emma  said,  for  a  comment  on  the 
scene,  "  I  could  envy  Italy  for  having  you,  more  than  you 
for  being  in  Italy." 

"  Feature  and  colour  !  "  said  Diana.  "  You  have  them 
here,  and  on  a  scale  that  one  can  embrace.  I  should  like 
to  build  a  hut  on  this  point,  and  wait  for  such  a  day  to 
return.  It  brings  me  to  life."  She  lifted  her  eyelids  on 
her  friend's  worn  sweet  face,  and  knowing  her  this  friend 
up  to  death,  past  it  in  her  hopes,  she  said  bravely,  "  It  is 


180  DIANA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

the  Emma  of  days  and  scenes  to  me  !  It  helps  me  to  for- 
get myself,  as  I  do  when  I  think  of  yoit,  dearest ;  but  the 
subject  has  latterly  been  haunting  me,  I  don't  know  why, 
and  ominously,  as  if  my  nature  were  about  to  horrify  my 
soul.  But  I  am  not  sentimentalizing,  you  are  really  this 
day  and  scene  in  my  heart." 

Emma  smiled  confidingly.  She  spoke  her  reflection  : 
"  The  heart  must  be  troubled  a  little  to  have  the  thought. 
The  flower  I  gather  here  tells  me  that  we  may  be  happy  in 
privation  and  suffering  if  simply  we  can  accept  beauty.  I 
won't  say  expel  the  passions,  but  keep  passion  sober,  a 
trotter  in  harness." 

Diana  caressed  the  ponies'  heads  with  the  droop  of  her 
whip  :  ^'  I  don't  think  I  know  him  ! "  she  said. 

Between  sincerity  and  a  suspicion  so  cloaked  and  dull 
that  she  did  not  feel  it  to  be  the  opposite  of  candour,  she 
fancied  she  was  passionless  because  she  could  accept  the 
visible  beauty,  which  was  Emma's  prescription  and  test ; 
and  she  forced  herself  to  make  much  of  it,  cling  to  it, 
devour  it ;  with  envy  of  Emma's  contemplative  happiness, 
through  whose  grave  mind  she  tried  to  get  to  the  peace  in 
it,  imagining  that  she  succeeded.  The  cloaked  and  dull 
suspicion  weighed  within  her  nevertheless.  She  took  it  for 
a  mania  to  speculate  on  herself.  There  are  states  of  the 
crimson  blood  when  the  keenest  wits  are  childish,  notably 
in  great-hearted  women  aiming  at  the  majesty  of  their  sex 
and  fearful  of  confounding  it  by  the  look  direct  and  the 
downright  word.  Yet  her  nature  compelled  her  inwardly 
to  phrase  the  sentence  :  "  Emma  is  a  wife  !  "  The  character 
of  her  husband  was  not  considered,  nor  was  the  meaning  of 
the  exclamation  pursued. 

They  drove  through  the  gorse  into  wild  land  of  heath 
and  flowering  hawthorn,  and  along  by  tracts  of  yew  and 
juniper  to  another  point,  jutting  on  a  furzy  sand-mound, 
rich  with  the  mild  splendour  of  English  scenery,  which 
Emma  stamped  on  her  friend's  mind  by  saying  :  "  A  cripple 
has  little  to  envy  in  you  who  can  fly  when  she  has  feasts 
like  these  at  her  doors." 

They  had  an  inclination  to  boast  on  the  drive  home  of 
the  solitude  the}'-  had  enjoyed ;  and  just  then,  as  the  head 
in  the  wood  wound  under  great  beeches,   they   beheld  a 


SUNLIGHT  AND  MOONLIGHT  DRIVES  181 

London  hat.  The  hat  was  plucked  from  its  head.  A  clear- 
faced  youthj  rather  flushed,  dusty  at  the  legs,  addressed 
Diana. 

"  Mr.  Rhodes  !  "  she  said,  not  discouragingly. 

She  was  petitioned  to  excuse  him  ;  he  thought  she  would 
wish  to  hear  the  news  in  town  last  night  as  early  as  pos- 
sible ;  he  hesitated  and  murmured  it. 

Diana  turned  to  Emma  :  "  Lord  Dannisburgh  !  "  —  her 
paleness  told  the  rest. 

Hearing  from  Mr.  Rhodes  that  he  had  walked  the  dis- 
tance from  town,  and  had  been  to  Copsley,  Lady  Dunstane 
invited  him  to  follow  the  pony-carriage  thither,  where  he 
was  fed  and  refreshed  by  a  tea-breakfast,  as  he  preferred 
walking  on  tea,  he  said.  "  I  took  the  liberty  to  call  at  Mrs. 
Warwick's  house,"  he  informed  her ;  "  the  footman  said 
she  was  at  Copsley.  I  found  it  on  the  map  —  I  knew 
the  direction  —  and  started  about  two  in  the  morning.  I 
wanted  a  walk." 

It  was  evident  to  her  that  he  was  one  of  the  young 
squires  bewitched  whom  beautiful  women  are  constantly 
enlisting.  There  was  no  concealment  of  it,  though  he 
stirred  a  sad  enviousness  in  the  invalid  lady  by  descanting 
on  the  raptures  of  a  walk  out  of  London  in  the  youngest 
light  of  day,  and  on  the  common  objects  he  had  noticed 
along  the  roadside,  and  through  the  woods,  more  sustain- 
ing, closer  with  nature  than  her  compulsory  feeding  on  the 
cream  of  things. 

"  You  are  not  fatigued?"  she  inquired,  hoping  for  that 
confession  at  least ;  but  she  pardoned  his  boyish  vaunting 
to  walk  the  distance  back  without  any  fatigue  at  all. 

He  had  a  sweeter  reward  for  his  pains  ;  and  if  the  busi- 
ness of  the  chronicler  allowed  him  to  become  attached  to 
pure  throbbing  felicity  wherever  it  is  encountered,  he  might 
be  diverted  by  the  blissful  unexpectedness  of  good  fortune 
befalling  Mr.  Arthur  Rhodes  in  having  the  honour  to  con- 
duct Mrs.  Warwick  to  town.  No  imagined  happiness,  even 
in  the  heart  of  a  young  man  of  two  and  twenty,  could  have 
matched  it.  He  was  by  her  side,  hearing  and  seeing  her, 
not  less  than  four  hours.  To  add  to  his  happiness,  Lady 
Dunstane  said  she  would  be  glad  to  welcome  him  again. 
She  thought  him  a  pleasant  specimen  of  the  self- vowed  squire. 


182  DIAKA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Diana  was  sure  that  there  would  be  a  communication  for 
her  of  some  sort  at  her  house  in  London ;  perhaps  a  mes- 
sage of  farewell  from  the  dying  lord,  now  dead.  Mr. 
Bhodes  had  only  the  news  of  the  evening  journals,  to  the 
effect  that  Lord  Dannisburgh  had  expired  at  his  residence, 
the  Priory,  Hallowmere,  in  Hampshire.  A  message  of  fare- 
well from  him,  she  hoped  for :  knowing  him  as  she  did,  it 
seemed  a  certainty ;  and  she  hungered  for  that  last  gleam 
of  life  in  her  friend.  She  had  no  anticipation  of  the  burden 
of  the  message  awaiting  her. 

A  consultation  as  to  the  despatching  of  the  message,  had 
taken  place  among  the  members  of  Lord  Dannisburgh's 
family  present  at  his  death.  Percy  Dacier  was  one  of  them, 
and  he  settled  the  disputed  point,  after  some  time  had  been 
spent  in  persuading  his  father  to  take  the  plain  view  of 
obligation  in  the  matter,  and  in  opposing  the  dowager 
countess,  his  grandmother,  by  stating  that  he  had  already 
sent  a  special  messenger  to  London.  Lord  Dannisburgh  on 
his  death-bed  had  expressed  a  wish  that  Mrs.  Warwick 
would  sit  with  him  for  an  hour  one  night  before  the  nails 
were  knocked  in  his  coffin.  He  spoke  of  it  twice,  putting 
it  the  second  time  to  Percy  as  a  formal  request  to  be  made 
to  her,  and  Percy  had  promised  him  that  Mrs.  Warwick 
should  have  the  message.  He  had  done  his  best  to  keep 
his  pledge,  aware  of  the  disrelish  of  the  whole  family  for 
the  lady's  name,  to  say  nothing  of  her  presence. 

"  She  won't  come,"  said  the  earl. 

"  She  '11  come,"  said  old  Lady  Dacier. 

"If  the  woman  respects  herself  she'll  hold  off  it,"  the 
earl  insisted  because  of  his  desire  that  way.  He  signified 
in  mutterings  that  the  thing  was  improper  and  absurd,  a 
piece  of  sentiment,  sickly  senility,  unlike  Lord  Dannisburgh. 
Also  that  Percy  had  been  guilty  of  excessive  folly. 

To  which  Lady  Dacier  nodded  her  assent,  remarking: 
"  The  woman  is  on  her  mettle.  From  what  I  've  heard  of 
her,  she  's  not  a  woman  to  stick  at  trifles.  She  '11  take  it  as 
a  sort  of  ordeal  by  touch,  and  she  '11  come." 

They  joined  in  abusing  Percy,  who  had  driven  away  to 
another  part  of  the  country.  Lord  Creedmore,  the  heir  of 
the  house,  was  absent,  hunting  in  America,  or  he  might 
temporarily   have   been    taken    into    favour   by   contrast. 


SUNLIGHT   AND  MOONLIGHT  DRIVES  183 

Ultimately  they  agreed  that  the  woman  must  "be  allowed  to 
enter  the  house,  but  could  not  be  received.  The  earl  was  a 
widower ;  his  mother  managed  the  family,  and  being  hard 
to  convince,  she  customarily  carried  her  point,  save  when  it 
involved  Percy's  freedom  of  action.  She  was  one  of  the 
veterans  of  her  sex  that  age  to  toughness  ;  and  the  "  hyster- 
ical fuss  "  she  apprehended  in  the  visit  of  this  woman  to 
Lord  Dannisburgh's  death-bed  and  body,  did  not  alarm  her. 
For  the  sake  of  the  household  she  determined  to  remain, 
shut  up  in  her  room.  Before  night  the  house  was  empty  of 
any  members  of  the  family  excepting  old  Lady  Dacier  and 
the  outstretched  figure  on  the  bed. 

Dacier  fled  to  escape  the  hearing  of  the  numberless 
ejaculations  re-awakened  in  the  family  by  his  uncle's  extra- 
ordinary dying  request.  They  were  an  outrage  to  the  lady, 
of  whom  he  could  now  speak  as  a  privileged  champion  ;  and 
the  request  itself  had  an  air  of  proving  her  stainless,  a  white 
soul  and  efficacious  advocate  at  the  celestial  gates  (reading 
the  mind  of  the  dying  man).  So  he  thought  at  one  moment : 
he  had  thought  so  when  charged  with  the  message  to  her ; 
had  even  thought  it  a  natural  wish  that  she  should  look  once 
on  the  face  she  would  see  no  more,  and  say  farewell  to  it,, 
considering  that  in  life  it  could  not  be  requested.  But  the 
susceptibility  to  sentimental  emotion  beside  a  death-bed, 
with  a  dying  man's  voice  in  the  ear,  requires  fortification 
if  it  is  to  be  maintained ;  and  the  review  of  his  uncle's 
character  did  not  tend  to  make  this  very  singular  request 
a  proof  that  the  lady's  innocence  was  honoured  in  it.  His 
epicurean  uncle  had  no  profound  esteem  for  the  kind  of 
innocence.  He  had  always  talked  of  Mrs.  Warwick  with 
warm  respect  for  her  :  Dacier  knew  that  he  had  bequeathed 
her  a  sum  of  money.  The  inferences  were  either  way. 
Lord  Dannisburgh  never  spoke  evilly  of  any  woman,  and  he 
was  perhaps  bound  to  indemnify  her  materially  as  well  as 
he  could  for  what  she  had  suffered.  —  On  the  other  hand, 
how  easy  it  was  to  be  the  dupe  of  a  woman  so  handsome  and 
clever.  —  Unlikely  too  that  his  uncle  would  consent  to  sit 
at  the  Platonic  banquet  with  her.  —  Judging  by  himself, 
Dacier  deemed  it  possible  for  man.  He  was  not  quick  to 
kindle,  and  had  lately  seen  much  of  her,  had  found  her  a 
Lady  Egeria,  helpful   in   counsel,  prompting,  inspiriting, 


184  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

reviving  as  well-waters,  and  as  temperately  cool:  not  one 
sign  of  native  slipperiness.  Nor  did  she  stir  the  mud  in 
him  upon  which  proud  man  is  built.  The  shadow  of  the 
scandal  had  checked  a  few  shifty  sensations  rising  now  and 
then  of  their  own  accord,  and  had  laid  them,  with  the  lady's 
benign  connivance.  This  was  good  proof  in  her  favour, 
seeing  that  she  must  have  perceived  of  late  the  besetting 
thirst  he  had  for  her  company  ;  and  alone  or  in  the  medley 
equally.  To  see  her,  hear,  exchange  ideas  with  her  ;  and  to 
talk  of  new  books,  try  to  listen  to  music  at  the  opera  and  at 
concerts,  and  admire  her  playing  of  hostess,  were  novel 
pleasures,  giving  him  fresh  notions  of  life,  and  strengthen- 
ing rather  than  disturbing  the  course  of  his  life's  business. 

At  any  rate,  she  was  capable  of  friendship.  Why  not 
resolutely  believe  that  she  had  been  his  uncle's  true  and 
simple  friend!  He  adopted  the  resolution,  thanking  her 
for  one  recognized  fact :  —  he  hated  marriage,  and  would  by 
this  time  have  been  in  the  yoke,  but  for  the  agreeable 
deviation  of  his  path  to  her  society.  Since  his  visit  to 
Copsley,  moreover.  Lady  Dunstane's  idolizing  of  her  friend 
had  influenced  him.  Eeflecting  on  it,  he  recovered  from 
the  shock  which  his  uncle's  request  had  caused. 

Certain  positive  calculations  were  running  side  by  side 
with  the  speculations  in  vapour.  His  messenger  would 
reach  her  house  at  about  four  of  the  afternoon.  If  then  at 
home,  would  she  decide  to  start  immediately  ?  —  Would  she 
come  ?  That  was  a  question  he  did  not  delay  to  answer. 
Would  she  defer  the  visit  ?  Death  replied  to  that.  She 
would  not  delay  it. 

She  would  be  sure  to  come  at  once.  And  what  of  the 
welcome  she  would  meet  ?  Leaving  the  station  in  London 
at  six  in  the  evening,  she  might  arrive  at  the  Priory,  all 
impediments  counted,  between  ten  and  eleven  at  night. 
Thence,  coldly  greeted,  or  not  greeted,  to  the  chamber  of 
death. 

A  pitiable  and  cruel  reception  for  a  woman  upon  such  a 
mission ! 

His  mingled  calculations  and  meditations  reached  that 
exclamatory  terminus  in  feeling,  and  settled  on  the  picture 
of  Diana,  about  as  clear  as  light  to  blinking  eyes,  but  enough 
for  him  to  realize  her  being  there  and  alone,  woefully  alone. 


SUNLIGHT   AND   MOONLIGHT   DRIVES  185 

The  supposition  of  an  absolute  loneliness  was  most  possible. 
He  had  intended  to  drive  back  the  next  day,  when  the  do- 
mestic storm  would  be  over,  and  take  the  chances  of  her 
coming.  It  seemed  now  a  piece  of  duty  to  return  at  night, 
a  traverse  of  twenty  rough  up  and  down  miles  from  Itchen- 
ford  to  the  heathland  rolling  on  the  chalk  wave  of  the 
Surrey  borders,  easily  done  after  the  remonstrances  of  his 
host  were  stopped. 

Dacier  sat  in  an  open  carriage,  facing  a  slip  of  bright  moon. 
Poetical  impressions,  emotions,  any  stirrings  of  his  mind  by 
the  sensational  stamp  on  it,  were  new  to  him,  and  while  he 
swam  in  them,  both  lulled  and  pricked  by  his  novel  accessi- 
bility to  nature's  lyrical  touch,  he  asked  himself  whether,  if 
he  were  near  the  throes  of  death,  the  thought  of  having 
Diana  Warwick  to  sit  beside  his  vacant  semblance  for  an 
hour  at  night  would  be  comforting.  And  why  had  his  uncle 
specified  an  hour  of  the  night  ?  It  was  a  sentiment,  like  the 
request:  curious  in  a  man  so  little  sentimental.  Yonder 
crescent  running  the  shadowy  round  of  the  hoop  roused 
comparisons.  Would  one  really  wish  to  have  her  beside  one 
in  death  ?  In  life  — ah  !  But  suppose  her  denied  to  us  in 
life.  Then  the  desire  for  her  companionship  appears  pass- 
ingly comprehensible.  Enter  into  tlie  sentiment,  you  see 
that  the  hour  of  darkness  is  naturally  chosen.  And  would 
even  a  grand  old  Pagan  crave  the  presence  beside  his  dead 
body  for  an  hour  of  the  night  of  a  woman  he  did  not  esteem  ? 
Dacier  answered  no.  The  negative  was  not  echoed  in  his 
mind.     He  repeated  it,  and  to  the  same  deadness. 

He  became  aware  that  he  had  spoken  for  himself,  and  he 
had  a  fit  of  sourness.  For  who  can  say  he  is  not  a  fool  before 
he  has  been  tried  by  a  woman  !  Dacier's  wretched  tendency 
under  vexation  to  conceive  grotesque  analogies,  anti-poetic, 
not  to  say  cockney  similes,  which  had  slightly  chilled  Diana 
at  Eovio,  set  him  looking  at  yonder  crescent  with  the  hoop, 
as  at  the  shape  of  a  white  cat  climbing  a  wheel.  Men  of  the 
northern  blood  will  sometimes  lend  their  assent  to  poetical 
images,  even  to  those  that  do  not  stun  the  mind  like  blud- 
geons and  imperatively,  by  much  repetition,  command  their 
assent  ;  and  it  is  for  a  solid  exchange  and  interest  in  usury 
with  soft  poetical  creatures  when  they  are  so  condescending ; 
but  they  are  seized  by  the  grotesque.     In  spite  of  efforts  to 


186  DIANA  OP  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

efface  or  supplant  it,  lie  saw  the  white  cat,  nothing  else,  even 
to  thinking  that  she  had  jumped  cleverly  to  catch  the  wheel. 
He  was  a  true  descendant  of  practical  hard-grained  fighting 
Northerners,  of  gnarled  dwarf  imaginations,  chivalrous 
though  they  were,  and  heroes  to  have  serviceable  and  valiant 
gentlemen  for  issue.  Without  at  all  tracing  back  to  its  origin 
his  detestable  image  of  the  white  cat  on  the  dead  circle,  he 
kicked  at  the  links  between  his  uncle  and  Diana  Warwick, 
whatever  the}'-  had  been ;  particularly  at  the  present  revival 
of  them.  Old  Lady  Dacier's  blunt  speech,  and  his  father's 
fixed  opinion,  hissed  in  his  head. 

They  were  ignorant  of  his  autumnal  visit  to  the  Italian 
Lakes,  after  the  winter's  Nile-boat  expedition ;  and  also  of 
the  degree  of  his  recent  intimacy  with  Mrs.  Warwick ;  or 
else,  as  he  knew,  he  would  have  heard  more  hissing  things. 
Her  patronage  of  Miss  Payuham  exposed  her  to  attacks 
where  she  was  deemed  vulnerable ;  Lady  Dacier  muttered 
old  saws  as  to  the  flocking  of  birds ;  he  did  not  accurately 
understand  it,  thought  it  indiscreet,  at  best.  But  in  re- 
gard to  his  experience,  he  could  tell  himself  that  a  woman 
more  guileless  of  luring  never  drew  breath.  On  the  con- 
trary, candour  said  it  had  always  been  he  who  had  schemed 
and  pressed  for  the  meeting.  He  was  at  liberty  to  do  it,  not 
being  bound  in  honour  elsewhere.  Besides,  despite  his 
acknowledgment  of  her  beauty,  Mrs.  Warwick  was  not  quite 
his  ideal  of  the  perfectly  beautiful  woman.  Constance 
Asper  came  nearer  to  it.  He  had  the  English  taste  for  red 
and  white,  and  for  cold  outlines  :  he  secretly  admired  a 
statuesque  demeanour  with  a  statue's  eyes.  The  national 
approbation  of  a  reserved  haughtiness  in  woman,  a  tempered 
disdain  in  her  slightly  lifted  small  upperlip  and  drooped  eye- 
lids, was  shared  by  him  ;  and  Constance  Asper,  if  not  exactly 
aristocratic  by  birth,  stood  well  for  that  aristocratic  insular 
type,  which  seems  to  promise  the  husband  of  it  a  casket  of 
all  the  trusty  virtues,  as  well  as  the  security  of  frigidity  in 
the  casket.  Such  was  Dacier's  native  taste  ;  consequently 
the  attractions  of  Diana  Warwick  for  him  were,  he  thought, 
chiefly  mental,  those  of  a  Lady  Egeria.  She  might  or  might 
not  be  good,  in  the  vulgar  sense.  She  was  an  agreeable 
woman,  an  amusing  companion,  very  suggestive,  inciting, 
animating  j  and  her  past  history  must  be  left  as  her  own. 


Diana's  night-watch  187 

Bid  it  matter  to  him  ?  What  he  saw  was  bright,  a  silver 
crescent  on  the  side  of  the  shadowy  ring.  Were  it  a 
question  of  marrying  her !  —  That  was  out  of  the  possibili- 
ties. He  remembered,  moreover,  having  heard  from  a  man, 
who  professed  to  know,  that  Mrs.  Warwick  had  started  in 
married  life  by  treating  her  husband  cavalierly  to  an  intoler- 
able degree ;  "  Such  as  no  Englishman  could  stand,"  the 
portly  old  informant  thundered,  describing  it  and  her  in  racy 
vernacular.  She  might  be  a  devil  of  a  wife.  She  was  a 
pleasant  friend ;  just  the  soft  bit  sweeter  than  male  friends 
which  gave  the  flavour  of  sex  without  the  artful  seductions. 
He  required  them  strong  to  move  him. 

He  looked  at  last  on  the  green  walls  of  the  Priory, 
scarcely  supposing  a  fair  watcher  to  be  within  ;  for  the  con- 
trasting pale  colours  of  dawn  had  ceased  to  quicken  the 
brilliancy  of  the  crescent,  and  summer  daylight  drowned 
it  to  fainter  than  a  silver  com  in  water.  It  lay  dispieced 
like  a  pulled  rag.  Eastward,  over  Surrey,  stood  the  full 
rose  of  morning.  The  Priory  clock  struck  four.  When 
the  summons  of  the  bell  had  gained  him  admittance,  and 
he  heard  that  Mrs.  Warwick  had  come  in  the  night,  he 
looked  back  through  the  doorway  at  the  rosy  colour,  and 
congratulated  himself  to  think  that  her  hour  of  watching 
was  at  an  end.  A  sleepy  footman  was  his  informant. 
Women  were  in  my  lord's  dressing-room,  he  said.  Up- 
stairs, at  the  death-chamber,  Dacier  paused.  No  sound 
came  to  him.  He  hurried  to  his  own  room,  paced  about, 
and  returned.  Expecting  to  see  no  one  but  the  dead,  he 
turned  the  handle,  and  the  two  circles  of  a  shaded  lamp,  on 
ceiling  and  on  table,  met  his  gaze. 


CHAPTER  XX 
Diana's  night-watch  in  the  chamber  of  death 

He  stepped  into  the  room,  and  thrilled  to  hear  the  quiet 
voice  beside  the  bed  :  "  Who  is  it  ?  " 

Apologies  and  excuses  were  on  liis  tongue.  The  vibration 
of  those  grave  tones  checked  them. 


188  DIANA  OF  THE   CROSS  WAYS 

"  It  is  you/'  she  said. 

She  sat  in  shadow,  her  hands  joined  on  her  lap.  An 
unopened  book  was  under  the  lamp. 

He  spoke  in  an  under  breath  :  ^'1  have  just  come.  I  was 
not  sure  I  should  find  you  here.     Pardon.'* 

"  There  is  a  chair." 

He  murmured  thanks  and  entered  into  the  stillness, 
observing  her. 

"  You  have  been  watching.  .  .  .  You  must  be  tired." 

"No." 

"  An  hour  was  asked,  only  one." 

*'  I  could  not  leave  him." 

"  Watchers  are  at  hand  to  relieve  you." 

"  It  is  better  for  him  to  have  me." 

The  chord  of  her  voice  told  him  of  the  gulfs  she  had 
sunk  in  during  the  night.  The  thought  of  her  endurance 
became  a  burden. 

He  let  fall  his  breath  for  patience,  and  tapped  the  floor 
with  his  foot. 

He  feared  to  discompose  her  by  speaking.  The  silence 
grew  more  fearful,  as  the  very  speech  of  Death  between 
them. 

"  You  came.  I  thought  it  right  to  let  you  know  instantly. 
I  hoped  you  would  come  to-morrow." 

*'l  could  not  delay." 

"  You  have  been  sitting  alone  here  since  eleven  ! " 

"I  have  not  found  it  long." 

"  You  must  want  some  refreshment  .  .  .  tea  ?  " 

"  I  need  nothing." 

"  It  can  be  made  ready  in  a  few  minutes." 

"I  could  not  eat  or  drink." 

He  tried  to  brush  away  the  impression  of  the  tomb  in  the 
heavily-curtained  chamber  by  thinking  of  the  summer-morn 
outside  ;  he  spoke  of  it,  the  rosy  sky,  the  dewy  grass,  the  pip- 
ing birds.    She  listened,  as  one  hearing  of  a  quitted  sphere. 

Their  breathing  in  common  was  just  heard  if  either  drew 
a  deeper  breath.  At  moments  his  eyes  wandered  and  shut. 
Alternately  in  his  mind  Death  had  vaster  meanings  and 
doubtfuller;  Life  cowered  under  the  shadow  or  outshone 
it.  He  glanced  from  her  to  the  figure  in  the  bed,  and  nh." 
seemed  swallowed. 


DIANA'S   NIGHT-WATCH  189 

He  said :  "  It  is  time  for  you  to  have  rest.  You  know 
your  room.     I  will  stay  till  the  servants  are  up." 

She  replied  :  "  No,  let  this  night  with  him  be  mine.'' 

"  I  am  not  intruding  ?  "  .  .  . 

*'  If  you  wish  to  remain  "... 

No  traces  of  weeping  were  on  her  face.  The  lamp-shade 
revealed  it  colourless,  and  lustreless  her  eyes.  She  was 
robed  in  black.     She  held  her  hands  clasped. 

*^  You  have  not  suif ered  ? '' 

"  Oh,  no." 

She  said  it  without  sighing :  nor  was  her  speech  mournful, 
only  brief. 

"  You  have  seen  death  before  ?  " 

''  I  sat  by  my  father  four  nights.  I  was  a  girl  then.  I 
cried  till  I  had  no  more  tears." 

He  felt  a  burning  pressure  behind  his  eyeballs. 

"Death  is  natural,"  he  said. 

"  It  is  natural  to  the  aged.  When  they  die  honoured  .  .  ." 
She  looked  where  the  dead  man  lay.  "  To  sit  beside  the 
young,  cut  off  from  their  dear  opening  life  !  .  .  ."  A 
little  shudder  swept  over  her.     "  Oh  !  that !  " 

"  You  were  very  good  to  come.  We  must  all  thank  you 
for  fulfilling  his  wish." 

*'  He  knew  it  would  be  my  wish." 

Her  hands  pressed  together. 

"  He  lies  peacefully  !  " 

"I  have  raised  the  lamp  on  him,  and  wondered  each 
time.  So  changeless  he  lies.  But  so  like  a  sleep  that  will 
wake.  We  never  see  peace  but  in  the  features  of  the  dead. 
Will  you  look  ?  They  are  beautiful.  They  have  a  heavenly 
sweetness." 

The  desire  to  look  was  evidently  recurrent  with  her. 
Dacier  rose. 

Their  eyes  fell  together  on  the  dead  man,  as  thoughtfully 
as  Death  allows  to  the  creatures  of  sensation. 

"  And  after  ?  "  he  said  in  low  tones. 

^'I  trust  to  my  Maker,"  she  replied.  "Do  you  see  a 
change  since  he  breathed  his  last  ?  " 

"Not  any." 

"  You  were  with  him  ?  " 

"  Not  in  the  room.     Two  minutes  later." 


190  DIAJSTA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  Who  ?  .  .  ." 

"My  father.     His  niece,  Lady  Cathairn." 

"  If  our  lives  are  lengthened  we  outlive  most  of  those  we 
would  have  to  close  our  eyes.     He  had  a  dear  sister." 

"  She  died  some  years  back." 

"  I  helped  to  comfort  him  for  that  loss." 

"  He  told  me  you  did." 

The  lamp  was  replaced  on  the  table. 

"  For  a  moment,  when  I  withdraw  the  light  from  him,  I 
feel  sadness.  As  if  the  light  we  lend  to  anything  were  of 
value  to  him  now  ! " 

She  bowed  her  head  deeply.  Dacier  left  her  meditation 
undisturbed.  The  birds  on  the  walls  outside  were  audible, 
tweeting,  chirping. 

He  went  to  the  window-curtains  and  tried  the  shutter- 
bars.  It  seemed  to  him  that  daylight  would  be  cheerfuller 
for  her.  He  had  a  thirst  to  behold  her  standing  bathed  in 
daylight. 

"  Shall  I  open  them  ?  "  he  asked  her. 

"  I  would  rather  the  lamp,"  she  said. 

They  sat  silently  until  she  drew  her  watch  from  her 
girdle.  "  My  train  starts  at  half-past  six.  It  is  a  walk  of 
thirty-five  minutes  to  the  station.  I  did  it  last  night  in 
that  time." 

"  You  walked  here  in  the  dark  alone  ?  " 

"  There  was  no  fly  to  be  had.  The  station-master  sent 
one  of  his  porters  with  me.  We  had  a  talk  on  the  road.  I 
like  those  men." 

Dacier  read  the  hour  by  the  mantelpiece  clock.  "If 
you  must  really  go  by  the  early  train,  I  will  drive  you." 

"  No,  I  will  walk  ;  I  prefer  it." 

"  I  will  order  your  breakfast  at  once." 

He  turned  on  his  heel.  She  stopped  him.  **No,  I  have 
no  taste  for  eating  or  drinking." 

"  Pray  ..."  said  he,  in  visible  distress. 

She  shook  her  head.  "I  could  not.  I  have  twenty 
minutes  longer.  I  can  find  my  way  to  the  station ;  it  is 
almost  a  straight  road  out  of  the  park-gates." 

His  heart  swelled  with  anger  at  the  household  for  the 
treatment  she  had  been  subjected  to^  judging  by  her  resolve 
not  to  break  bread  in  the  house. 


Diana's  night-watch  191 

They  resumed  their  silent  sitting.  The  intervals  for  a 
word  to  pass  between  them  were  long,  and  the  ticking  of 
the  time-piece  fronting  the  death-bed  ruled  the  chamber, 
scarcely  varied. 

The  lamp  was  raised  for  the  final  look,  the  leave-taking. 

Dacier  buried  his  face,  thinking  many  things  —  the 
common  multitude  in  insurrection. 

"  A  servant  should  be  told  to  come  now,"  she  said.  "  I 
have  only  to  put  on  my  bonnet  and  I  am  ready." 

"You  will  take  no  .  .  .?" 

"Kothing." 

"  It  is  not  too  late  for  a  carriage  to  be  ordered." 

<<]Sro  — the  walk!" 

They  separated. 

He  roused  the  two  women  in  the  dressing-room,  asleep 
with  heads  against  the  wall.  Thence  he  sped  to  his  own 
room  for  hat  and  overcoat,  and  a  sprinkle  of  cold  water. 
Descending  the  stairs,  he  beheld  his  companion  issuing 
from  the  chamber  of  death.  Her  lips  were  shut,  her  eye- 
lids nervously  tremulous. 

They  were  soon  in  the  warm  sweet  open  air,  and  they 
walked  without  an  interchange  of  a  syllable  through  the 
park  into  the  white  hawthorn  lane,  glad  to  breathe.  Her 
nostrils  took  long  draughts  of  air,  but  of  the  change  of 
scene  she  appeared  scarcely  sensible. 

At  the  park-gates,  she  said :  "  There  is  no  necessity  for 
your  coming. 

His  answer  was  :  "  I  think  of  myself.  I  gain  something 
every  step  I  walk  with  you." 

"  To-day  is  Thursday,  "  said  she.   "  The  funeral  is  .  .  .  ?  " 

"  Monday  has  been  fixed.  According  to  his  directions, 
lie  will  lie  in  the  churchyard  of  his  village  —  not  in  the 
family  vault." 

''  I  know,"  she  said  hastily.  "  They  are  privileged  who 
follow  him  and  see  the  cofiin  lowered.  He  spoke  of  this 
quiet  little  resting-place." 

"  Yes,  it 's  a  good  end.  I  do  not  wonder  at  his  wish  for 
the  honour  you  have  done  him.  I  could  wish  it  too.  But 
more  living  than  dead  —  that  is  a  natural  wish." 

"  It  is  not  to  be  called  an  honour." 

"  I  should  feel  it  so  — an  honour  to  me." 


192  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

"  It  is  a  friend's  duty.  The  word  is  too  harsh ;  —  it  was 
his  friend's  desire.  He  did  not  ask  it  so  much  as  he  sanc- 
tioned it.  For  to  him  what  has  my  sitting  beside  him 
been ! '' 

"  He  had  the  prospective  happiness.'' 

^'  He  knew  well  that  my  soul  would  be  with  him  —  as  it 
was  last  night.  But  he  knew  it  would  be  my  poor  human 
happiness  to  see  him  with  my  eyes,  touch  him  with  my 
hand,  before  he  passed  from  our  sight." 

Dacier  exclaimed  :  "  How  you  can  love ! " 

"  Is  the  village  church  to  be  seen  ?  "  she  asked. 

"To  the  right  of  those  elms;  that  is  the  spire.  The 
black  spot  below  is  a  yew.  You  love  with  the  whole  heart 
when  you  love." 

"  I  love  my  friends,"  she  replied. 

"  You  tempt  me  to  envy  those  who  are  numbered  among 
them." 

"  They  are  not  many." 

"  They  should  be  grateful." 

^' You  have  some  acquaintance  with  them  all." 

"  And  an  enemy  ?  Had  you  ever  one  ?  Do  you  know 
of  one  ?  " 

"  Direct  and  personal  designedly  ?  I  think  not.  We 
give  that  title  to  those  who  are  disinclined  to  us  and  add 
a  dash  of  darker  colour  to  our  errors.  Foxes  have  enemies 
in  the  dogs ;  heroines  of  melodramas  have  their  persecut- 
ing villains.  I  suppose  that  conditions  of  life  exist  where 
one  meets  the  original  complexities.  The  bad  are  in  every 
rank.  The  inveterately  malignant  I  have  not  found.  Cir- 
cumstances may  combine  to  make  a  whisper  as  deadly  as  a 
blow,  though  not  of  such  evil  design.  Perhaps  if  we  lived 
at  a  Court  of  a  magnificent  despot  we  should  learn  that  we 
are  less  highly  civilized  than  we  imagine  ourselves ;  but 
that  is  a  fire  to  the  passions,  and  the  extreme  is  not  the 
perfect  test.  Our  civilization  counts  positive  gains  —  un- 
less you  take  the  melodrama  for  the  truer  picture  of  us. 
It  is  always  the  most  popular  with  the  English. — And 
look,  what  a  month  June  is  !  Yesterday  morning  I  was 
with  Lady  Dunstane  on  her  heights,  and  I  feel  double  the 
age.  He  was  fond  of  this  wild  country.  We  think  it  a 
desert,  a  blank,  whither  he  has  gone,  because  we  will  strain 


Diana's  night-watch  193 

to  see  in  the  .utter  dark,  and  nothing  can  come  of  that  but 
the  bursting  of  the  eyeballs." 

Dacier  assented  :  "  There's  no  use  in  peering  beyond  the 
limits." 

"No,"  said  she;  "the  effect  is  like  the  explaining  of 
things  to  a  dull  head  —  the  finishing  stroke  to  the  under- 
standing !  Better  continue  to  brood.  We  get  to  some 
unravelment  if  we  are  left  to  our  own  efforts.  I  quarrel 
with  no  priest  of  any  denomination.  That  they  should 
quarrel  among  themselves  is  comprehensible  in  their  wis- 
dom, for  each  has  the  specific.  But  they  show  us  their 
way  of  solving  the  great  problem,  and  we  ought  to  thank 
them,  though  one  or  the  other  abominate  us.  You  are 
advised  to  talk  with  Lady  Dunstane  on  these  themes.  She 
is  perpetually  in  the  antechamber  of  death,  and  her  soul 
is  perennially  sunshine.  —  See  the  pretty  cottage  under  the 
laburnum  curls !     Who  lives  there  ?  " 

"  His  gamekeeper,  Simon  Rofe." 

"  And  what  a  playground  for  the  children,  that  bit  of  com- 
mon by  their  garden-palings !  and  the  pond,  and  the  blue 
hills  over  the  furzes.  I  hope  those  people  will  not  be 
turned  out." 

Dacier  could  not  tell.  He  promised  to  do  his  best  for 
them. 

"  But,"  said  she,  "you  are  the  lord  here  now." 

"Not  likely  to  be  the  tenant.  Incomes  are  wanted  to 
support  even  small  estates." 

"  The  reason  is  good  for  courting  the  income." 

He  disliked  the  remark;  and  when  she  said  presently: 
"Those  windmills  make  the  landscape  homely,"  he  re- 
joined :  "  They  remind  one  of  our  wheeling  London  gamins 
round  the  cab  from  the  station." 

"  They  remind  you,"  said  she,  and  smiled  at  the  chance 
discordant  trick  he  had,  remembering  occasions  when  it 
had  crossed  her. 

"  This  is  homelier  than  Eovio,"  she  said ;  "  quite  as  nice 
in  its  way." 

"  You  do  not  gather  flowers  here." 

"  Because  my  friend  has  these  at  her  feet." 

"  May  one  petition  without  a  rival,  then,  for  a  sou- 
venir ?  " 

18 


194  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

''  Certainly,  if  you  care  to  have  a  common  buttercup.'' 

They  reached  the  station,  five  minutes  in  advance  of  the 
train.  His  coming  manoeuvre  was  early  detected,  and  she 
drew  from  her  pocket  the  little  book  he  had  seen  lying  un- 
opened on  the  table,  and  said:  "I  shall  have  two  good 
hours  for  reading." 

"You  will  not  object?  ...  I  must  accompany  you  to 
town.  Permit  it,  I  beg.  You  shall  not  be  worried  to 
talk." 

"  No ;  I  came  alone  and  return  alone." 

*'  Fasting  and  unprotected !  Are  you  determined  to  take 
away  the  worst  impression  of  us  ?  Do  not  refuse  me  this 
favour." 

"  As  to  fasting,  I  could  not  eat :  and  unprotected  no 
woman  is  in  England  if  she  is  a  third-class  traveller.  That 
is  my  experience  of  the  class ;  and  I  shall  return  among 
my  natural  protectors  —  the  most  unselfishly  chivalrous  to 
women  in  the  whole  world." 

He  had  set  his  heart  on  going  with  her,  and  he  attempted 
eloquence  in  pleading,  but  that  exposed  him  to  her  humour ; 
he  was  tripped. 

"It  is  not  denied  that  you  belong  to  the  knightly  class," 
she  said;  ^'and  it  is  not  necessary  that  you  should  wear 
armour  and  plumes  to  proclaim  it;  and  your  appearance 
would  be  ample  protection  from  the  drunken  sailors  travel- 
ling, you  say,  on  this  line  ;  and  I  may  be  deplorably  mis- 
taken in  imagining  that  I  could  tame  them.  But  your 
knightliness  is  due  elsewhere ;  and  I  commit  myself  to  the 
fortune  of  war.  It  is  a  battle  for  women  everywhere; 
under  the  most  favourable  conditions  among  my  dear  com- 
mon English.  I  have  not  my  maid  with  me,  or  else  I 
should  not  dare." 

She  paid  for  a  third-class  ticket,  amused  by  Dacier's  look 
of  entreaty  and  trouble. 

' '  Of  course  I  obey,"  he  murmured. 

"I  have  the  habit  of  exacting  it  in  matters  concerning 
my  independence,"  she  said;  and  it  arrested  some  rumbling 
notions  in  his  head  as  to  a  piece  of  audacity  on  the  starting 
of  the  train.  They  walked  up  and  down  the  platform  till 
the  bell  rang  and  the  train  came  rounding  beneath  an  arch. 

"  Oh,  by  the  way,  may  I  ask  ?  "  —  he  said :  "  was  it  your 


DT ana's  night-watch  l95 

article  in  Whitmonby's  journal  on  a  speech  of  mine  last 
week  ?  " 

''The  guilty  writer  is  confessed." 

"  Let  me  thank  you." 

*'  Don't.  But  try  to  believe  it  written  on  public  grounds 
—  if  the  task  is  not  too  great." 

"  I  may  call  ?  " 

"  You  will  be  welcome.'' 

''  To  tell  you  of  the  funeral  —  the  last  of  him !  ** 

*'  Do  not  fail  to  come." 

She  could  have  laughed  to  see  him  jumping  on  the  steps 
of  the  third-class  carriages  one  after  another  to  choose  her 
company  for  her.  In  those  pre-democratic  blissful  days 
before  the  miry  Deluge,  the  opinion  of  the  requirements 
of  poor  English  travellers  entertained  by  the  Seigneur 
Directors  of  the  class  above  them,  was  that  they  differed 
from  cattle  in  stipulating  for  seats.  With  the  exception  of 
that  provision  to  suit  their  weakness,  the  accommodation  ex- 
tended to  them  resembled  pens,  and  the  seats  were  emphat- 
ically seats  of  penitence,  intended  to  grind  the  sitter  for 
his  mean  pittance  payment  and  absence  of  aspiration  to  a 
higher  state.  Hard  angular  wood,  a  low  roof,  a  shabby 
square  of  window  aloof,  demanding  of  him  to  quit  the  seat 
he  insisted  on  having,  if  he  would  indulge  in  views  of  the 
passing  scenery,  —  such  was  the  furniture  of  dens  where  a 
refinement  of  castigation  was  practised  on  villain  poverty 
by  denying  leathers  to  the  windows,  or  else  buttons  to  the 
leathers,  so  that  the  windows  had  either  to  be  up  or  down, 
but  refused  to  shelter  and  freshen  simultaneously. 

Dacier  selected  a  compartment  occupied  by  two  old 
women,  a  mother  and  babe  and  little  maid,  and  a  labouring 
man.  There  he  installed  her,  with  an  eager  look  that  she 
would  not  notice. 

"  You  will  want  the  window  down,"  he  said. 

She  applied  to  her  fellow-travellers  for  the  permission ; 
and  struggling  to  get  the  window  down,  he  was  irritated 
to  animadvert  on  •'  these  carriages  "  of  the  benevolent  rail- 
way Company. 

''  Do  not  forget  that  the  wealthy  are  well  treated,  or  you 
may  be  unjust,"  said  she,  to  pacify  him. 

His  mouth  sharpened  its  line  while   he  tried  arts  and 


196  DIANA   OF   THE   CROSSWAYS 

energies  on  the  refractory  window.  She  told  him  to  leave 
it.  "You  can't  breathe  this  atmosphere!''  he  cried,  and 
called  to  a  porter,  who  did  the  work,  remarking  that  it  was 
rather  stiff. 

The  door  was  banged  and  fastened.  Dacier  had  to  hang  on 
the  step  to  see  her  in  the  farewell.  From  the  platform  he 
saw  the  top  of  her  bonnet ;  and  why  she  should  have  been 
guilty  of  this  freak  of  riding  in  an  unwholesome  carriage, 
tasked  his  power  of  guessing.  He  was  too  English  even  to 
have  taken  the  explanation,  for  he  detested  the  distinguish- 
ing of  the  races  in  his  country,  and  could  not  therefore  have 
comprehended  her  peculiar  tenacity  of  the  sense  of  injury 
as  long  as  enthusiasm  did  not  arise  to  obliterate  it.  He  re- 
quired a  course  of  lessons  in  Irish. 

Sauntering  down  the  lane,  he  called  at  Simon  Kofe's 
cottage,  and  spoke  very  kindly  to  the  gamekeeper's  wife. 
That  might  please  Diana.  It  was  all  he  could  do  at 
present. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

'*THE    YOUNG    MINISTER    OF    STATE " 

Descriptions  in  the  newspapers  of  the  rural  funeral  of 
Lord  Dannisburgh  had  the  effect  of  rousing  flights  of 
tattlers  with  a  twittering  of  the  disused  name  of  Warwick ; 
our  social  Gods  renewed  their  combat,  and  the  verdict  of 
the  jury  was  again  overhauled,  to  be  attacked  and  main- 
tained, the  carpers  replying  to  the  champions  that  they 
held  to  their  view  of  it :  as  heads  of  bull-dogs  are  expected 
to  do  when  they  have  got  a  grip  of  one.  It  is  a  point  of 
muscular  honour  with  them  never  to  relax  their  hold. 
They  will  tell  you  why  :  —  they  formed  that  opinion  from 
the  first.  And  but  for  the  swearing  of  a  particular  wit- 
ness, upon  whom  the  plaintiff  had  been  taught  to  rely, 
the  verdict  would  have  been  different  —  to  prove  their 
soundness  of  judgement.  They  could  speak  from  private 
positive  information  of  certain  damnatory  circumstances, 
derived   from   authentic   sources.     Visits   of  a  gentleman 


"THE  YOUNG  MINISTER  OF  STATE"  197 

to  the  house  of  a  married  lady  in  the  absence  of  the  hus- 
band? Oh!  — The  British  Lucretia  was  very  properly 
not  legally  at  home  to  the  masculine  world  of  that  day. 
She  plied  her  distaff  in  pure  seclusion,  meditating  on  her 
absent  lord;  or  else  a  fair  proportion  of  the  masculine 
world,  which  had  not  yet,  has  not  yet,  'doubled  Cape 
Turk,'  approved  her  condemnation  to  the  sack. 

There  was  talk  in  the  feminine  world,  at  Lady  Wathiu's 
assemblies.     The  elevation  of  her  husband  had  extended 
and  deepened  her  influence  on  the  levels  where  it  reigned 
before,  but  without,  strange  as  we  may  think  it  now,  assist- 
ing to  her  own  elevation,  much  aspired  for,  to  the  smooth 
and  lively  upper  pavement  of  Society,  above  its  tumbled 
strata.     She  was  near  that  distinguished  surface,  not  on  it. 
Her  circle  was  practically  the  same  as  it  was  previous  to 
the  coveted  nominal  rank  enabling  her  to  trample  on  those 
beneath  it.     And  women  like  that  Mrs.  Warwick,  a  woman 
of  no  birth,  no  money,  not  even  honest  character,  enjoyed 
the   entry   undisputed,    circulated   among    the   highest:  — 
because  people  took  her  rattle  for  wit!  — and  because  also 
our  nobility.  Lady  Wathin  feared,  had  no  due  regard  for 
morality.     Our  aristocracy,  brilliant  and  ancient  though  it 
was,  merited  rebuke.     She  grew   severe   upon  aristocratic 
scandals,  whereof  were  plenty  among  the  frolicsome  host 
just  overhead,  as  vexatious  as  the  drawing-room  party  to 
the  lodger  in   the  floor  below,  who  has   not  received   an 
invitation  to  partake  of  the  festivities,  and  is  required  to 
digest  the  noise.     But  if  ambition  is  oversensitive,  moral 
indignation   is   ever   consolatory,   for  it  plants  us  on   the 
Judgement  Seat.     There  indeed  we  may,  sitting  with  the 
very  Highest,  forget  our  personal  disappointments  in  dis- 
pensing reprobation  for  misconduct,  however  eminent  the 

offenders. 

She  was  Lady  Wathin,  and  once  on  an  afternoon  s  call  to 
see  her  poor  Lady  Dunstane  at  her  town-house,  she  had 
been  introduced  to  Lady  Pennon,  a  patroness  of  Mrs.  War- 
wick, and  had  met  a  snub  — an  icy  check-bow  of  the  aristo- 
cratic head  from  the  top  of  the  spinal  column,  and  not  a 
word,  not  a  look;  — the  half-turn  of  a  head  devoid  of 
mouth  and  eyes!  She  practised  that  forbidding  check- 
bow   herself    to   perfection,    so   the   endurance   of   it  was 


198  DIANA  OF  THE   CEOSSWAYS 

horrible.  A  noli  me  tangere,  her  husband  termed  it,  in 
his  ridiculous  equanimity;  and  he  might  term  it  what  he 
pleased  —  it  was  insulting.  The  solace  she  had  was  in 
hearing  that  hideous  Eadical  Kevolutionary  things  were 
openly  spoken  at  Mrs.  Warwick's  evenings  with  her 
friends:  —  impudently  named  ^'the  elect  of  London." 
Pleasing  to  reflect  upon  Mrs.  Warwick  as  undermining 
her  supporters,  tc  bring  them  some  day  down  with  a 
crash!  Her  "elect  of  London"  were  a  queer  gathering, 
by  report  of  them!  And  Mr.  Whitmonby  too,  no  doubt 
a  celebrity,  was  the  righthand  man  at  these  dinner-parties 
of  Mrs.  Warwick.  Where  will  not  men  go  to  be  flattered 
by  a  pretty  woman  !  He  had  declined  repeated,  successive 
invitations  to  Lady  Wathin's  table.  But  there  of  course 
he  would  not  have  had  "the  freedom  :"  that  is,  she  rejoiced 
in  thinking  defensively  and  offensively,  a  moral  wall  en- 
closed her  topics.  The  Hon.  Percy  Dacier  had  been 
brought  to  her  Thursday  afternoon  by  Mr.  Quintin  Manx, 
and  he  had  one  day  dined  with  her;  and  he  knew  Mrs. 
Warwick  —  a  little,  he  said.  The  opportunity  was  not  lost 
to  convey  to  him,  entirel}^  in  the  interest  of  sweet  Con- 
stance Asper,  that  the  moral  world  entertained  a  settled 
view  of  the  very  clever  woman  Mrs.  Warwick  certainly 
was.  —  He  had  asked  Diana,  on  their  morning  walk  to  the 
station,  whether  she  had  an  enemy :  so  prone  are  men, 
educated  by  the  Drama  and  Fiction  in  the  belief  that  the 
garden  of  civilized  life  must  be  at  the  mercy  of  the  old 
wild  devourers,  to  fancy  "  villain  whispers  "  an  indication  of 
direct  animosity.  Lady  Wathin  had  no  sentiment  of  the 
kind. 

But  she  had  become  acquainted  with  the  other  side  of 
the  famous  Dannisburgh  case  —  the  unfortunate  plaintiff ; 
and  compassion  as  well  as  morality  moved  her  to  put  on  a 
speaking  air  when  Mr.  Warwick's  name  was  mentioned. 
She  pictured  him  to  the  ladies  of  her  circle  as  "  one  of  our 
true  gentlemen  in  his  deportment  and  his  feelings."  He  was, 
she  would  venture  to  say,  her  ideal  of  an  English  gentleman. 
"  But  now,"  she  added  commiseratingly,  "  ruined ;  ruined 
in  his  health  and  in  his  prospects."  A  lady  inquired  if  it 
was  the  verdict  that  had  thus  affected  him.  Lady  Wathin^s 
answer  was  reported  over  moral,  or  substratum,  London; 


"THE  YOUNG  MINISTER   OF   STATE"  199 

"  He  is  the  victim  of  a  fatal  passion  for  his  wife ;  and 
would  take  her  back  to-morrow  were  she  to  solicit  his  for- 
giveness." Morality  had  something  to  say  against  this 
active  marital  charity,  attributable,  it  was  to  be  feared,  to 
weakness  of  character  on  the  part  of  the  husband.  Still 
Mrs.  Warwick  undoubtedly  was  one  of  those  women  (of 
Satanic  construction)  who  have  the  art  of  enslaving  the 
men  unhappy  enough  to  cross  their  path.  The  nature  of 
the  art  was  hinted,  with  the  delicacy  of  dainty  feet  which 
have  to  tread  in  mire  to  get  to  safety.  Men,  alas!  are 
snared  in  this  way.  Instances  too  numerous  for  the  good 
repute  of  the  swinish  sex,  were  cited,  and  the  question  of 
how  Morality  was  defensible  from  their  grossness  passed 
without  a  tactical  reply.  There  is  no  defence.  Those 
women  come  like  the  Cholera  Morbus  —  and  owing  to 
similar  causes.  They  will  prevail  until  the  ideas  of  men 
regarding  women  are  purified.  Nevertheless  the  husband 
who  could  forgive,  even  propose  to  forgive,  was  deemed  by 
consent  generous,  however  weak.  Though  she  might  not 
have  been  wholly  guilty,  she  had  bitterly  offended.  And 
he  despatched  an  emissary  to  her  ?  —  The  theme,  one  may, 
in  their  language,  "fear,"  was  relished  as  a  sugared  acid. 
It  was  renewed  in  the  late  Autumn  of  the  year,  when  An- 
TONiA  published  her  new  book,  entitled  The  Young  Min- 
ister OF  State.  The  signature  of  the  authoress  was  now 
known;  and  from  this  resurgence  of  her  name  in  public, 
suddenly  a  radiation  of  tongues  from  the  circle  of  Lady 
Wathin  declared  that  the  repentant  Mrs.  Warwick  had 
gone  back  to  her  husband's  bosom  and  forgiveness  !  The 
rumour  spread  in  spite  of  sturdy  denials  at  odd  corners, 
counting  the  red-hot  proposal  of  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  to  eat 
his  head  and  boots  for  breakfast  if  it  was  proved  correct. 
It  filled  a  yawn  of  the  Clubs  for  the  afternoon.  Soon  this 
wanton  rumour  was  met  and  stifled  by  another  of  more 
morbific  density,  heavily  charged  as  that  which  led  the  sad 
Eliza  to  her  ^yvQ. 

Antonia's  hero  was  easily  identified.  The  Young  Min- 
ister OF  State  could  be  he  only  who  was  now  at  all  her 
parties,  always  meeting  her ;  had  been  spied  walking  with 
her  daily  in  the  park  near  her  house,  on  his  march  down  to 
Westminster  during  the  session,  and  who  positively  went 


200  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

to  concerts  and  sat  under  fiddlers  to  be  near  her.  It  ac- 
counted moreover  for  his  treatment  of  Constance  Asper. 
What  effrontery  of  the  authoress,  to  placard  herself  with 
him  in  a  book !  The  likeness  of  the  hero  to  Percy  Dacier 
once  established  became  striking  to  glaringness  —  a  proof 
of  her  ability,  and  more  of  her  audacity ;  still  more  of  her 
intention  to  flatter  him  up  to  his  perdition.  By  the  things 
written  of  him,  one  would  imagine  the  conversations  going 
on  behind  the  scenes.  She  had  the  wiles  of  a  Cleopatra, 
not  without  some  of  the  Nilene's  experiences.  A  youth- 
ful Antony-Dacier  would  be  little  likely  to  escape  her 
toils.  And  so  promising  a  young  man!  The  sigh,  the 
tear  for  weeping  over  his  destruction,  almost  fell,  such 
vivid  realizing  of  the  prophesy  appeared  in  its  pathetic 
pronouncement. 

This  low  rumour,  or  malaria,  began  blowing  in  the  Win- 
ter, and  did  not  travel  fast ;  for  strangely,  there  was  hardly 
a  breath  of  it  in  the  atmosphere  of  Dacier,  none  in  Diana's. 
It  rose  from  groups  not  so  rapidly  and  largely  mixing,  and 
less  quick  to  kindle ;  whose  crazy  sincereness  battened  on 
the  smallest  morsel  of  fact  and  collected  the  fictitious  by 
slow  absorption.  But  as  guardians  of  morality,  often  doing 
good  duty  in  their  office,  they  are  persistent.  When  Par- 
liament assembled,  Mr.  Quintin  Manx,  a  punctual  member 
of  the  House,  if  nothing  else,  arrived  in  town.  He  was  in- 
vited to  dine  with  Lady  Wathin.  After  dinner  she  spoke 
to  him  of  the  absent  Constance,  and  heard  of  her  being 
well,  and  expressed  a  great  rejoicing  at  that.  Whereupon 
the  burly  old  shipowner  frowned  and  puffed.  Constance, 
he  said,  had  plunged  into  these  new  spangle,  candle  and 
high  singing  services  ;  was  all  for  symbols,  harps,  effigies, 
what  not.  Lady  Wathin 's  countenance  froze  in  hearing  of 
it.  She  led  Mr.  Quintin  to  a  wall-sofa,  and  said :  "  Surely 
the  dear  child  must  have  had  a  disappointment,  for  her  to 
have  taken  to  those  foolish  displays  of  religion  !  It  is 
generally  a  sign." 

"  Well,  ma'am  —  my  lady  —  I  let  girls  go  their  ways  in 
such  things.  I  don't  interfere.  But  it's  that  fellow,  or 
nobody,  with  her.  She  has  fixed  her  girl's  mind  on  him, 
and  if  she  can't  columbine  as  a  bride,  she  will  as  a  nun. 
Young  people  must  be  at  some  harlequinade." 


"THE  YOUNG  lyilNISTER  OF  STATE*'  201 

•'But  it  is  very  shocking.     And  lie  ?  " 

"  He  plays  fast  and  loose,  warm  and  cold.  I  m  reaay  to 
settle  twenty  times  a  nobleman's  dowry  on  my  niece  :  and 
she 's  a  fine  ^irl,  a  handsome  girl,  educated  up  to  the  brim, 
fitVqueen  i't  in  any  drawing-room.  He  ^^oMs  her  by  some 
arts  that  don't  hold  him,  it  seems.     He  's  all  for  politics. 

"  Constance  can  scarcely  be  his  dupe  so  far,  I  should 
think." 

"  How  do  you  mean  ?  "  ,    . .  •  j  «*-  >> 

"  Everything  points  to  one  secret  of  his  conduct. 

Ladjmthin's  head  shook  for  her  sex's  pained  affirma- 

*' Mr  Quintin  in  the  same  fashion  signified  the  downright 
negative.     "  The  fellow 's  as  cold  as  a  fish.'  ^^ 

"  Flattery  will  do  anything.     There  is,  I  fear,  one. 

«  Widow  ?  wife  ?  maid  ?  " 

"  Married,  I  regret  to  say."  ...       , 

"Well  if  he  'd  get  over  with  it,"  said  Qumtm,  m  whose 
notions  the  seductiveness  of  a  married  woman  could  be  only 
temporary,  for  all  the  reasons  pertaining  to  her  state.  At 
the  same  time  his  view  of  Percy  Dacier  was  changed  in 
thinking  it  possible  that  a  woman  could  divert  him  from  his 
political  and  social  interests.  He  looked  incredulous. 
^  "You  have  heard  of  a  Mrs.  Warwick  ?''   said  Lady 

Wathin.  ,  Af   tt.v 

"Warwick'  I  have.  IVe  never  seen  her.  At  my 
broker's  in  the  City  yesterday  I  saw  the  name  on  a 
Memorandum  of  purchase  of  Shares  in  a  concern  promising 
ten  per  cent.,  and  not  likely  to  carry  the  per  annum  into 
the  plural.  He  told  me  she  was  a  grand  kind  of  woman, 
past  advising." 

"  For  what  amount  ?  " 

"  Some  thousands,  I  think  it  was."  ,   -,    . 

"She  has  no  money:"  Lady  Wathin  corrected  hex 
emphasis :  "  or  ought  to  have  none." 

"  She  can't  have  got  it  from  Aim." 

"  Did  vou  notice  her  Christian  name  ?  " 

"I  don't  recollect  it,  if  I  did.     I  thought  the  woman  a 

°"  Would  you  consider  me  a  busybody  were  I  to  try  to 


202  DIAKA   OF   THE  CROSS  WAYS 

mitigate  this  woman's  evil  influence  ?  I  love  dear  Con. 
stance,  and  should  be  happy  to  serve  her." 

"  I  want  my  girl  married,"  said  (fid  Quintin.  ^'  He  's  one 
of  my  Parliamentary  chiefs,  with  first-rate  prospects  ;  good 
family,  good  sober  fellow  —  at  least  I  thought  so ;  by 
nature,  I  mean;  barring  your  incantations.  He  suits  me, 
she  liking  him." 

"  She  admires  him,  I  am  sure." 

"  She  's  dead  on  end  for  the  fellow  ! " 

Lady  Wathin  felt  herself  empowered  by  Quintin  Manx 
to  undertake  the  release  of  sweet  Constance  Asper's  knight 
from  the  toils  of  his  enchantress.  For  this  purpose  she 
had  first  an  interview  with  Mr.  Warwick,  and  next  she 
hurried  to  Lady  Dunstane  at  Copsley.  There,  after  jum- 
bling Mr.  Warwick's  connubial  dispositions  and  Mrs.  War- 
wick's last  book,  and  Mr.  Percy  Dacier's  engagement  to 
the  great  heiress  in  a  gossipy  hotch-potch,  she  contrived  to 
gather  a  few  items  of  fact,  as  that  The  Young  Minister 
was  probably  modelled  upon  Mr.  Percy  Dacier.  Lady 
Dunstane  made  no  concealment  of  it  as  soon  as  she  grew 
sensible  of  the  angling.  But  she  refused  her  help  to  any 
reconciliation  between  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Warwick.  She  de- 
clined to  listen  to  Lady  Wathin's  entreaties.  She  declined 
to  give  her  reasons.  —  These  bookworm  women,  whose 
pride  it  is  to  fancy  that  they  can  think  for  themselves, 
have  a  great  deal  of  the  heathen  in  them,  as  morality  dis- 
covers when  it  wears  the  enlistment  ribands  and  applies  to 
them  to  win  recruits  for  a  service  under  the  direct  blessing 
of  Providence. 

Lady  Wathin  left  some  darts  behind  her,  m  the  form  of 
moral  exclamations ;  and  really  intended  morally.  For 
though  she  did  not  like  Mrs.  Warwick,  she  had  no  wish 
to  wound,  other  than  by  stopping  her  further  studies  of 
the  Young  Minister,  and  conducting  him  to  the  young  lady 
loving  him,  besides  restoring  a  bereft  husband  to  his  own. 
How  sadly  pale  and  worn  poor  Mr.  Warwick  appeared ! 
The  portrayal  of  his  withered  visage  to  Lady  Dunstane  had 
quite  failed  to  gain  a  show  of  sympathy.  And  so  it  is  ever 
with  your  book-worm  women  pretending  to  be  philosophical ! 
You  sound  them  vainly  for  a  manifestation  of  the  common- 
est human  sensibilities.     They   turn  over  the  leaves  of  a 


"THE   YOUNG  MINISTER   OF  STATE"  203 

Latin  book  on  their  laps  while  you  are  supplicating  them 
to  assist  in  a  work  of  charity  ! 

Lady  Wathin's  inter jectory  notes  haunted  Emma's  ear. 
Yet  she  had  seen  nothing  in  Tony  to  let  her  suppose  that 
there  was  trouble  of  her  heart  below  the  surface ;  and  her 
Tony  when  she  came  to  Copsley  shone  in  the  mood  of  the 
day  of  Lord  Dannisburgh's  drive  down  from  London  with 
her.  She  was  running  on  a  fresh  work  ;  talked  of  composi- 
tion as  a  trifle. 

"  I  suppose  the  Young  Minister  is  Mr.  Percy  Dacier  ?  " 
said  Emma. 

"  Between  ourselves  he  is,"  Diana  replied,  smiling  at  a 
secret  guessed.  "You  know  my  model  and  can  judge  of 
the  likeness." 

"  You  write  admiringly  of  him,  Tony." 

"  And  I  do  admire  him.  So  would  you,  Emmy,  if  you 
knew  him  as  well  as  I  do  now.  He  pairs  with  Mr.  Eed- 
worth ;  he  also  is  the  friend  of  women.  But  he  lifts  us  to 
rather  a  higlier  level  of  intellectual  friendship.  When  the 
ice  has  melted  —  and  it  is  thick  at  first  —  he  pours  forth 
all  his  ideas  without  reserve ;  and  they  are  deep  and  noble. 
Ever  since  Lord  Dannisburgh's  death  and  our  sitting  to- 
gether, we  have  been  warm  friends  —  intimate,  I  would  say, 
if  it  could  be  said  of  one  so  self-contained.  In  that  respect, 
no  young  man  was  ever  comparable  with  him.  And  I  am 
encouraged  to  flatter  myself  that  he  unbends  to  me  more 
than  to  others." 

"He  is  engaged,  or  partly,  I  hear;  why  does  he  not 
marry?" 

"  I  wish  he  would  ! "  Diana  said,  with  a  most  brilliant 
candour  of  aspect. 

Emma  read  in  it,  that  it  would  complete  her  happiness, 
possibly  by  fortifying  her  sense  of  security;  and  that 
seemed  right.  Her  own  meditations,  illumined  by  the 
beautiful  face  in  her  presence,  referred  to  the  security  of 
Mr.  Dacier. 

"So,  then,  life  is  going  smoothly,"  said  Emma. 

"Yes,  at  a  good  pace  and  smoothly:  not  a  torrent  — 
Thames-like,  '  without  o'erflowing  full.'  It  is  not  Lugano 
and  the  Salvatore.  Perhaps  it  is  better:  as  action  is  better 
than  musing." 


204  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"No  troubles  whatever?" 

"None.  Well,  except  an  ^adorer'  at  times.  I  have 
to  take  him  as  my  portion.  An  impassioned  Caledonian 
has  a  little  bothered  me.  I  met  him  at  Lady  Pennon's, 
and  have  been  meeting  him,  as  soon  as  I  put  foot  out  of 
my  house,  ever  since.  If  I  could  impress  and  impound 
him  to  marry  Mary  Paynham,  I  should  be  glad.  By  the 
way,  I  have  consented  to  let  her  try  at  a  portrait  of  me. 
jSTo,  I  have  no  troubles.  I  have  friends,  the  choicest  of 
the  nation;  I  have  health,  a  field  for  labour,  fairish  suc- 
cess with  it;  a  mind  alive,  such  as  it  is.  I  feel  like  that 
midsummer  morning  of  our  last  drive  out  together,  the 
sun  high,  clearish,  clouded  enough  to  be  cool.  And  still 
I  envy  Emmy  on  her  sofa,  mastering  Latin,  biting  at 
Greek.  What  a  wise  recommendation  that  was  of  Mr. 
Kedworth's !  He  works  well  in  the  House.  He  spoke 
excellently  the  other  night.'' 

"He  runs  over  to  Ireland  this  Easter." 

"  He  sees  for  himself,  and  speaks  with  authority.  He 
sees  and  feels.  Englishmen  mean  well,  but  they  require 
an  extremity  of  misery  to  waken  their  feelings." 

"It  is  coming,  he  says;  and  absit  omen  !  " 

"Mr.  Dacier  says  he  is  the  one  Englishman  who  may 
always  be  sure  of  an  Irish  hearing;  and  he  does  not  cajole 
them,  you  know.  But  the  English  defect  is  really  not 
want  of  feeling  so  much  as  want  of  foresight.  They  will 
not  look  ahead.  A  famine  ceasing,  a  rebellion  crushed, 
they  jog  on  as  before,  with  their  Dobbin  trot  and  blinker 
confidence  in  *  Saxon  energy.'  They  should  study  the 
Irish.  I  think  it  was  Mr.  Eedworth  who  compared  the  gov- 
erning of  the  Irish  to  the  management  of  a  horse:  the 
rider  should  not  grow  restive  when  the  steed  begins  to 
kick:  calmer;  firm,  calm,  persuasive." 

"Does  Mr.  Dacier  agree?  " 

"Not  always.  He  has  the  inveterate  national  belief 
that  Celtic  blood  is  childish,  and  the  consequently  illogical 
disregard  of  its  hold  of  impressions.  The  Irish  —  for  I 
have  them  in  my  heart,  though  I  have  not  been  among 
them  for  long  at  a  time  —  must  love  you  to  serve  you,  and 
will  hate  you  if  you  have  done  them  injury  and  they  have 
not  wiped  it  out  —  they  with  a  treble  revenge,  or  you  with 


"THE    YOUNG   MINlSTEll    OF    STATE"  205 

cordial  benefits.  I  have  told  him  so  again  and  again: 
ventured  to  suggest  measures." 

"He  listens  to  you,  Ton}'?  " 

"He  says  I  have  brains.     It  ends  in  a  compliment." 

"You  have  inspired  Mr.  Redworth." 

"If  I  have,  I  have  lived  for  some  good." 

Altogether  her  Tony's  conversation  proved  to  Emma 
that  her  perusal  of  the  model  of  The  Young  Minister  of 
State  was  an  artist's,  free,  open,  and  not  discoloured  by 
the  personal  tincture.  Her  heart  plainly  was  free  and 
undisturbed.  She  had  the  same  girl's  love  of  her  walks 
where  wild  flowers  grew;  if  possible,  a  keener  pleasure. 
She  hummed  of  her  happiness  in  being  at  Copsley,  singing 
her  Planxty  Kelly  and  The  Puritani  by  turns.  She  stood 
on  land:  she  was  not  on  the  seas.  Emma  thought  so  with 
good  reason. 

She  stood  on  land,  it  was  true,  but  she  stood  on  a  cliff 
of  the  land,  the  seas  below  and  about  her;  and  she  was 
enabled  to  hoodwink  her  friend  because  the  assured  sen- 
sation of  her  firm  footing  deceived  her  own  soul,  even 
while  it  took  short  flights  to  the  troubled  waters.  Of  her 
firm  footing  she  was  exultingly  proud.  She  stood  high, 
close  to  danger,  without  giddiness.  If  at  intervals  her  soul 
flew  out  like  lightning  from  the  rift  (a  mere  shot  of  invol- 
untary fancy,  it  seemed  to  her),  the  suspicion  of  instability 
made  her  draw  on  her  treasury  of  impressions  of  the  morn- 
ings at  Lugano  —  her  loftiest,  purest,  dearest;  and  these 
reinforced  her.  She  did  not  ask  herself  why  she  should 
have  to  seek  them  for  aid.  In  other  respects  her  mind 
was  alert  and  held  no  sly  covers,  as  the  fiction  of  a  perfect 
ignorant  innocence  combined  with  common  intelligence 
would  have  us  to  suppose  that  the  minds  of  women  can  do. 
She  was  honest  as  long  as  she  was  not  directly  questioned, 
pierced  to  the  innermost  and  sanctum  of  the  bosom.  She 
could  honestly  summon  bright  light  to  her  eyes  in  wishing 
the  man  were  married.  She  did  not  ask  herself  why  she 
called  it  up.  The  remorseless  progressive  interrogations 
of  a  Jesuit  Father  in  pursuit  of  the  bosom's  verity  might 
have  transfixed  it  and  shown  lier  to  herself  even  then  a 
tossing  vessel  as  to  the  spirit,  far  away  from  that  firm  land 
she  trod  so  bravely. 


206  DIANA  OF  THE   GROSSWAYS 

Descending  from  the  woody  heights  upon  London,  Diana 
would  have  said  that  her  only  anxiety  concerned  young  Mr. 
Arthur  Rhodes,  whose  position  she  considered  precarious, 
and  who  had  recently  taken  a  drubbing  for  venturing  to 
show  a  peep  of  his  head,  like  an  early  crocus,  in  the 
literary  market.  Her  Antonia's  last  book  had  been  re- 
viewed obediently  to  smart  taps  from  the  then  command- 
ing baton  of  Mr.  Tonans,  and  Mr.  Whitmonby's  choice 
picking  of  specimens  down  three  columns  of  his  paper.  A 
Literary  Eeview  (Charles  Rainer's  property)  had  suggested 
that  perhaps  "  the  talented  authoress  might  be  writing  too 
rapidly;  "  and  another,  actuated  by  the  public  taste  of  the 
period  for  our  "  vigorous  homely  Saxon  "  in  one  and  two 
syllable  words,  had  complained  of  a  *' tendency  to  polysyl- 
labic phraseology."  The  remainder,  a  full  majority,  had 
sounded  eulogy,  with  all  their  band-instruments,  drum, 
trumpet,  fife,  trombone.  Her  foregoing  work  had  raised 
her  to  Fame,  which  is  the  Court  of  a  Queen  when  the  lady 
has  beauty  and  social  influence,  and  critics  are  her  dedi- 
cated courtiers,  gaping  for  the  royal  mouth  to  be  opened, 
and  reserving  the  kicks  of  their  independent  manhood  for 
infamous  outsiders,  whom  they  hoist  in  the  style  and  par- 
ticular service  of  pitchforks.  They  had  fallen  upon  a  little 
volume  of  verse,  ''like  a  body  of  barn-door  hens  on  a 
stranger  chick,"  Diana  complained  ;  and  she  chid  herself 
angrily  for  letting  it  escape  her  forethought  to  propitiate 
them  on  the  author's  behalf.  Young  Rhodes  was  left  with 
scarce  a  feather;  and  what  remained  to  him  appeared  a 
preposterous  ornament  for  the  decoration  of  a  shivering 
and  welted  poet.  He  laughed,  or  tried  the  mouth  of 
laughter.  Antonia's  literary  conscience  was  vexed  at  the 
different  treatment  she  had  met  and  so  imperatively  needed 
that  the  reverse  of  it  would  have  threatened  the  smooth 
sailing  of  her  costly  household.  A  merry-go-round  of 
creditors  required  a  corresponding  whirligig  of  receipts. 
She  felt  mercenary,  debased  by  comparison  with  the  well- 
scourged  verse-mason,  Orpheus  of  the  untenanted  city,  who 
had  done  his  publishing  ingenuously  for  glory:  a  good 
instance  of  the  comic-pathetic.  She  wrote  to  Emma,  beg- 
ging her  to  take  him  in  at  Copsley  for  a  few  days :  —  "I 
told  you  I  had  no  troubles.     I  am  really  troubled  about 


"THE   YOUNG   MINISTER   OF   STATE"  207 

this  poor  boy.  He  has  very  little  money  and  has  embarked 
on  literature.  I  cannot  induce  any  of  my  friends  to  lend 
him  a  hand.  Mr.  Redworth  gruffly  insists  on  his  going 
back  to  his  law-clerk's  office  and  stool,  and  Mr.  Dacier 
says  that  no  place  is  vacant.  The  reality  of  Lord  Dannis- 
burgh*s  death  is  brought  before  me  by  my  helplessness. 
He  would  have  made  him  an  assistant  private  Secretary, 
pending  a  Government  appointment,  rather  than  let  me 
plead  in  vain." 

Mr.  Rhodes  with  his  travelling  bag  was  packed  off  to 
Copsley,  to  enjoy  a  change  of  scene  after  his  run  of  the 
gauntlet.  He  was  very  heartily  welcomed  by  Lady 
Dunstane,  both  for  her  Tony's  sake  and  his  own  modest 
worship  of  that  luminary,  which  could  permit  of  being 
transparent;  but  chiefly  she  welcomed  him  as  the  living 
proof  of  Tony's  disengagement  from  anxiety,  since  he  was 
her  one  spot  of  trouble,  and  could  easily  be  comforted  by 
reading  with  her,  and  wandering  through  the  Spring 
woods  along  the  heights.  He  had  a  happy  time,  midway 
in  air  between  his  accomplished  hostess  and  his  protecting 
Goddess.  His  bruises  were  soon  healed.  Each  day  was 
radiant  to  him,  whether  it  rained  or  shone;  and  by  his 
looks  and  what  he  said  of  himself  Lady  Dunstane  under- 
stood that  he  was  in  the  highest  temper  of  the  human 
creature  tuned  to  thrilling  accord  with  nature.  It  was 
her  generous  Tony's  work.  She  blessed  it,  and  liked  the 
youth  the  better. 

During  the  stay  of  Mr.  Arthur  Rhodes  at  Copsley,  Sir 
Lukin  came  on  a  visit  to  his  wife.  He  mentioned  reports 
in  the  scandal-papers:  one,  that  Mr.  P.  D.  would  shortl}^ 
lead  to  the  altar  the  lovely  heiress  Miss  A.,  Percy  Dacier 
and  Constance  Asper :  —  another,  that  a  reconciliation  was 
to  be  expected  between  the  beautiful  authoress  Mrs.  W. 
and  her  husband.  *' Perhaps  it  's  the  best  thing  she  can 
do,"  Sir  Lukin  added. 

Lady  Dunstane  pronounced  a  woman's  unforgiving: 
"Never."  The  revolt  of  her  own  sensations  assured  her 
of  Tony's  unconquerable  repugnance.  In  conversation 
subsequently  with  Arthur  Rhodes,  she  heard  that  he  knew 
the  son  of  Mr.  Warwick's  attorney,  a  Mr.  Fenn;  and  he 
had  gathered  from  him  some  information  of  Mr.  Warwick's 


208  DIANA   OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

condition  of  health.  It  had  been  alarming;  young  Fenn  said 
it  was  confirmed  heart-disease.  His  father  frequently  saw 
Mr.  Warwick,  and  said  he  was  fretting  himself  to  death. 

It  seemed  just  a  possibility  that  Tony's  natural  com- 
passionateness  had  wrought  on  her  to  immolate  herself 
and  nurse  to  his  end  the  man  who  had  wrecked  her  life. 
Lady  Dunstane  waited  for  news.  At  last  she  wrote,  touch- 
ing the  report  incidentally.  There  was  no  reply.  The 
silence  ensuing  after  such  a  question  responded  forcibly. 


CHAPTER  XXII 


BETWEEN   DIANA    AND    DACIER:    THE    WIND    EAST    OVER 

BLEAK   LAND 

On  the  third  day  of  the  Easter  recess  Percy  Dacier 
landed  from  the  Havre  steamer  at  Caen  and  drove  straight- 
way for  the  sandy  coast,  past  fields  of  colza  to  brine-blown 
meadows  of  coarse  grass,  and  then  to  the  low  dunes  and 
long  stretching  sands  of  the  ebb  in  semicircle :  a  desolate 
place  at  that  season;  with  a  dwarf  fishing-village  by  the 
shore ;  an  East  wind  driving  landward  in  streamers  every 
object  that  had  a  scrap  to  fly.  He  made  head  to  the  inn, 
where  the  first  person  he  encountered  in  the  passage  was 
Diana's  maid  Danvers,  who  relaxed  from  the  dramatic 
exaggeration  of  her  surprise  at  the  sight  of  a  real  English 
gentleman  in  these  woebegone  regions,  to  inform  him  that 
her  mistress  might  be  found  walking  somewhere  along  the 
sea-shore,  and  had  her  dog  to  protect  her.  They  were  to 
stay  here  a  whole  week,  Danvers  added,  for  a  conveyance 
of  her  private  sentiments.  Second  thoughts  however  whis- 
pered to  her  shrewdness  that  his  arrival  could  only  be  by 
appointment.  She  had  been  anticipating  something  of  the 
sort  for  some  time. 

Dacier  butted  against  the  stringing  wind,  that  kept  him 
at  a  rocking  incline  to  his  left  for  a  mile.  He  then  dis- 
cerned in  what  had  seemed  a  dredger's  dot  on  the  sands,  a 
lady's  figure,  unmistakably  she,  without  the  corroborating 


BETWEEN  DTANA  AND   DACIER  209 

testimony  of  Leander  paw-deep  in  the  low-tide  water.  She 
was  out  at  a  distance  on  the  ebb-sands,  hurtled,  gyred, 
beaten  to  all  shapes,  m  rolls,  twists,  volumes,  like  a  blown 
banner-flag,  by  the  pressing  wind.  A  kerchief  tied  her 
bonnet  under  her  chin.  Bonnet  and  breast-ribands  rattled 
rapidly  as  drummer-sticks.  She  stood  near  the  little  run- 
ning ripple  of  the  flat  sea-water,  as  it  hurried  from  a  long 
streaked  back  to  a  tiny  imitation  of  spray.  When  she 
turned  to  the  shore  she  saw  him  advancing,  but  did  not 
recognize;  when  they  met  she  merely  looked  with  wide 
parted  lips.     This  was  no  appointment. 

"I  had  to  see  you,"  Dacier  said. 

She  coloured  to  a  deeper  red  than  the  rose-conjuring 
wind  had  whipped  in  her  cheeks.  Her  quick  intuition  of 
the  reason  of  his  coming  barred  a  mental  evasion,  and  she 
had  no  thought  of  asking  either  him  or  herself  what  special 
urgency  had  brouglit  him. 

"I  have  been  here  four  days." 

"Lady  Esquart  spoke  of  the  place." 

"Lady  Esquart  should  not  have  betrayed  me." 

"She  did  it  inadvertently,  without  an  idea  of  my  profiting 
by  it." 

Diana  indicated  the  scene  in  a  glance.  "  Dreary  coun- 
try, do  you  tnink  ?  " 

"  Anywhere ! "  —  said  he. 

They  walked  up  the  sand-heap.  The  roaring  Easter  with 
its  shrieks  and  whistles  at  her  ribands  was  not  favourable 
to  speech.  His  "  Anywhere !  "  had  a  penetrating  signifi- 
cance, the  fuller  for  the  break  that  left  it  vague. 

Speech  between  them  was  commanded ;  he  could  not  be 
suffered  to  remain.  She  descended  upon  a  sheltered  path- 
way running  along  a  ditch,  the  border  of  pastures  where 
cattle  cropped,  raised  heads,  and  resumed  their  one  com- 
forting occupation. 

Diana  gazed  on  them,  smarting  from  the  buffets  of  the 
wind  she  had  met. 

"No  play  of  their  tails  to-day,"  she  said,  as  she  slack- 
ened her  steps.     "You  left  Lady  Esquart  well  ?  " 

"  Lady  Esquart  ...  I  think  was  well.  I  had  to  see 
you.  I  thought  you  would  be  with  her  in  Berkshire. 
She  told  me  of  a  little  sea-side  place  close  to  Caen." 

14 


210  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"You  had  to  see  me  ?" 

"  I  miss  you  now  if  it 's  a  day ! " 

"I  heard  a  story  in  London  ..." 

"In  London  there  are  many  stories.  I  heard  one.  Is 
there  a  foundation  for  it  ?  " 

"No." 

He  breathed  relieved.  "  I  wanted  to  see  you  once  before 
,  .  .  if  it  was  true.  It  would  have  made  a  change  in  my 
life  —  a  gap." 

"You  do  me  the  honour  to  like  my  Sunday  evenings  ?  " 

"Beyond  everything  London  can  offer." 

"A  letter  would  have  reached  me." 

"  I  should  have  had  to  wait  for  the  answer.  There  is  no 
truth  in  it  ?  " 

Her  choice  was  to  treat  the  direct  assailant  frankly  or 
imperil  her  defence  by  the  ordinary  feminine  evolutions, 
which  might  be  taken  for  inviting :  poor  pranks  always. 

"There  have  been  overtures,"  she  said. 

"Forgive  me;  I  have  scarcely  the  right  to  ask  .  .  .  speak 
of  it." 

"  My  friends  may  use  their  right  to  take  an  interest  in 
my  fortunes." 

"  I  thought  I  might,  on  my  way  to  Paris,  turn  aside  .  .  . 
coming  by  this  route." 

"If  you  determined  not  to  lose  much  of  your  time." 

The  coolness  of  her  fencing  disconcerted  a  gentleman 
conscious  of  his  madness.  She  took  instant  advantage  of 
any  circuitous  move;  she  gave  him  no  practicable  point. 
He  was  little  skilled  in  the  arts  of  attack,  and  felt  that 
she  checked  his  impetuousness ;  respected  her  for  it,  chafed 
at  it,  writhed  with  the  fervours  precipitating  him  here, 
and  relapsed  on  his  pleasure  in  seeing  her  face,  hearing 
her  voice. 

"Your  happiness,  I  hope,  is  the  chief  thought  in  such  a 
case,"  he  said. 

"I  am  sure  you  would  consider  it." 

"I  can't  quite  forget  my  own." 

"You  compliment  an  ambitious  hostess." 

Dacier  glanced  across  the  pastures.  "  What  was  it  that 
tempted  you  to  this  place?" 

"A  poet  would  say  it  looks  like  a  figure  in  the  shroud. 


BETWEEN   DIANA   AND   DACIER  211 

It  has  no  features ;  it  has  a  sort  of  grandeur  belonging  to 
death.  I  heard  of  it  as  the  place  where  I  might  be  certain 
of  not  meeting  an  acquaintance." 

"And  I  am  the  intruder." 

"An  hour  or  two  will  not  give  you  that  title." 

"Am  I  to  count  the  minutes  by  my  watch?  " 

"By  the  sun.  We  will  supply  you  an  omelette  and 
piquette,  and  send  you  back  sobered  and  friarly  to  Caen 
for  Paris  at  sunset." 

"  Let  the  fare  be  Spartan.  I  could  take  my  black  broth 
with  philosophy  every  day  of  the  year  under  your  auspices. 
What  I  should  miss  ..." 

"  You  bring  no  news  of  the  world  or  the  House?  " 

"None.  You  know  as  much  as  I  know.  The  Irish 
agitation  is  chronic.  The  Corn-Law  threatens  to  be  the 
same." 

"  And  your  Chief  —  in  personal  colloquy?  " 

"  He  keeps  a  calm  front.  I  may  tell  you :  —  there  is 
nothing  I  would  not  confide  to  you :  he  has  let  fall  some 
dubious  words  in  private.  I  don't  know  what  to  think  of 
them." 

"  But  if  he  should  waver?  " 

"  It 's  not  wavering.     It 's  the  openness  of  his  mind." 

"Ah!  the  mind.  We  imagine  it  free.  The  House  and 
the  country  are  the  sentient  frame  governing  the  mind  of 
the  politician  more  than  his  ideas.  He  cannot  think  inde- 
pendently of  them :  —  nor  I  of  my  natural  anatomy.  You 
will  test  the  truth  of  that  after  your  omelette  and  piquette, 
and  marvel  at  the  quitting  of  your  line  of  route  for  Paris. 
As  soon  as  the  mind  attempts  to  think  independently,  it  is 
like  a  kite  with  the  cord  cut,  and  performs  a  series  of  darts 
and  frisks,  that  have  the  look  of  wildest  liberty  till  you 
see  it  fall  flat  to  earth.  The  openness  of  his  mind  is  most 
honourable  to  him." 

"Ominous  for  his  party." 

"  Likely  to  be  good  for  his  country." 

"That  is  the  question." 

"Prepare  to  encounter  it.  In  politics  I  am  with  the 
active  minority  on  behalf  of  the  inert  but  suffering 
majority.  That  is  my  rule.  It  leads,  unless  you  have  a 
despotism,  to  the  conquering  side.    It  is  always  the  noblest. 


212  DIANA   OF   THE   CROSS  WAYS 

I  won't  say,  listen  to  me;  only  do  believe  my  words  have 
some  weight.     This  is  a  question  of  bread." 

"It  involves  many  other  questions." 

"And  how  clearly  those  leaders  put  their  case!  They 
are  admirable  debaters.  If  I  were  asked  to  write  against 
them,  I  should  have  but  to  quote  them  to  confound  my 
argument.  I  tried  it  once,  and  wasted  a  couple  of  my 
precious  hours." 

"They  are  cogent  debaters,"  Dacier  assented.  "They 
make  me  wince  now  and  then,  without  convincing  me:  — 
I  own  it  to  you.  The  confession  is  not  agreeable,  though 
it 's  a  small  matter." 

"One's  pride  may  feel  a  touch  with  the  foils  as  keenly 
as  the  point  of  a  rapier,"  said  Diana. 

The  remark  drew  a  sharp  look  of  pleasure  from  him. 

"Does  the  Princess  Egeria  propose  to  dismiss  the  indi- 
vidual she  inspires,  when  he  is  growing  most  sensible  of 
her  wisdom?  " 

"  A  young  Minister  of  State  should  be  gleaning  at  large 
when  holiday  is  granted  him." 

Dacier  coloured.  "  May  I  presume  on  what  is  currently 
reported?  " 

"Parts,  parts;  a  bit  here,  a  bit  there,"  she  rejoined. 
"  Authors  find  their  models  where  they  can,  and  generally 
hit  on  the  nearest." 

"  Happy  the  nearest ! " 

"If  you  run  to  interjections  I  shall  cite  you  a  sentence 
from  your  latest  speech  in  the  House." 

He  asked  for  it,  and  to  school  him  she  consented  to 
flatter  with  her  recollection  of  his  commonest  words: 
"*  Dealing  with  subjects  of  this  nature  emotionally  does 
not  advance  us  a  calculable  inch. ' " 

"I  must  have  said  that  in  relation  to  hard  matter  of 
business." 

"It  applies.  There  is  my  hostelry,  and  the  spectral 
form  of  Danvers,  utterly  depaysee.  Have  you  spoken  to 
the  poor  soul  ?  I  can  never  discover  the  links  of  her 
attachment  to  my  service." 

"  She  knows  a  good  mistress.  —  1  have  but  a  few  minutes, 
if  you  are  relentless.  May  I  .  .  .  shall  I  ever  be  privi- 
leged to  speak  your  Christian  name?" 


BETWEEN  DIANA  AND  DAGIER  213 

*'  My  Christian  name !  It  is  Pagan.  In  one  sphere  I 
am  Hecate.     Kemember  that." 

"I  am  not  among  the  people  who  so  regard  you." 

"The  time  may  come." 

"Diana!" 

" Constance ! " 

"I  break  no  tie.  I  owe  no  allegiance  whatever  to  the 
name." 

*'Keep  to  the  formal  title  with  me.  We  are  Mrs. 
Warwick  and  Mr.  Dacier.  I  think  I  am  two  years  younger 
than  you;  socially  therefore  ten  in  seniority;  and  I  know 
how  this  flower  of  friendship  is  nourished  and  may  be 
withered.  You  see  already  what  you  have  done?  You 
have  cast  me  on  the  discretion  of  my  maid.  I  suppose  her 
trusty,  but  I  am  at  her  mercy,  and  a  breath  from  her  to 
the  people  beholding  me  as  Hecate  queen  of  Witches  ! .  .  . 
I  have  a  sensation  of  the  scirocco  it  would  blow." 

"In  that  event,  the  least  I  can  offer  is  my  whole  life." 

"We  will  not  conjecture  the  event." 

"  The  best  I  could  hope  for !  " 

"I  see  I  shall  have  to  revise  the  next  edition  of  The 
Young  Minister,  and  make  an  emotional  curate  of  him. 
Observe  Dan  vers.  The  woman  is  wretched;  and  now  she 
sees  me  coming  she  pretends  to  be  using  her  wits  in  study- 
ing the  things  about  her,  as  I  have  directed.  She  is  a 
riddle.  I  have  the  idea  that  any  morning  she  may  explode; 
and  yet  I  trust  her  and  sleep  soundly.  I  must  be  free, 
though  I  vex  the  world's  watchdogs.  —  So,  Danvers,you 
are  noticing  how  thoroughly  Frenchwomen  do  their  work." 

Danvers  replied  with  a  slight  mincing:  "They  may, 
ma'am;  but  they  chatter  chatter  so." 

"The  result  proves  that  it  is  not  a  waste  of  energy. 
They  manage  their  fowls  too." 

"They  've  no  such  thing  as  mutton,  ma'am." 

Dacier  patriotically  laughed. 

"  She  strikes  the  apology  for  wealthy  and  leisurely  land- 
lords," Diana  said. 

Danvers  remarked  that  the  poor  fed  meagrely  in  France. 
She  was  not  convinced  of  its  being  good  for  them  by  hear- 
ing that  they  could  work  on  it  sixteen  hours  out  of  the 
four  and  twenty. 


214  DIANA  OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

Mr.  Percy  Dacier's  repast  was  furnished  to  him  half  an 
hour  later.  At  sunset  Diana,  taking  Danvers  beside  her, 
walked  with  him  to  the  line  of  the  country  road  bearing 
on  Caen.  The  wind  had  sunk.  A  large  brown  disk 
paused  rayless  on  the  western  hills. 

"A  Dacier  ought  to  feel  at  home  in  Normandy;  and  you 
may  have  sprung  from  this  neighbourhood,"  said  she, 
simply  to  chat.  "Here  the  land  is  poorish,  and  a  mile 
inland  rich  enough  to  bear  repeated  crops  of  colza,  which 
tries  the  soil,  I  hear.  As  for  beauty,  those  blue  hills  you 
see,  enfold  charming  valleys.  I  meditate  an  expedition 
to  Harcourt  before  1  return.  An  English  professor  of  his 
native  tongue  at  the  Lycee  at  Caen  told  me  on  my  way 
here  that  for  twenty  shillings  a  week  you  may  live  in 
royal  ease  round  about  Harcourt.  So  we  have  our  bed  and 
board  in  prospect  if  fortune  fails  us,  Danvers." 

"I  would  rather  die  in  England,  ma'am,"  was  the  maid's 
reply. 

Dacier  set  foot  on  his  carriage-step.  He  drew  a  long 
breath  to  say  a  short  farewell,  and  he  and  Diana  parted. 

They  parted  as  the  plainest  of  sincere  good  friends,  each 
at  heart  respecting  the  other  for  the  repression  of  that 
which  their  hearts  craved;  any  word  of  which  might  have 
carried  them  headlong,  bound  together  on  a  Mazeppa-race, 
with  scandal  for  the  hounding  wolves,  and  social  ruin  for 
the  rocks  and  torrents. 

Dacier  was  the  thankfuller,  the  most  admiring  of  the 
two;  at  the  same  time  the  least  satisfied.  He  saw  the 
abyss  she  had  aided  him  in  escaping;  and  it  was  refresh- 
ful to  look  abroad  after  his  desperate  impulse.  Prominent 
as  he  stood  before  the  world,  he  could  not  think  without  a 
shudder  of  behaving  like  a  young  frenetic  of  the  passion. 
Those  whose  aim  is  at  the  leadership  of  the  English  people 
know,  that  however  truly  based  the  charges  of  hypocrisy, 
soundness  of  moral  fibre  runs  throughout  the  country  and 
is  the  national  integrity,  which  may  condone  old  sins  for 
present  service,  but  will  not  have  present  sins  to  flout  it. 
He  was  in  tune  with  the  English  character.  The  passion 
was  in  him  nevertheless,  and  the  stronger  for  a  slow 
growth  that  confirmed  its  union  of  the  mind  and  heart. 
Her  counsel  fortified  him,  her  suggestions  opened  springs  j 


BETWEEN  DIAKA  AND  DACIEB  215 

her  phrases  were  golden-lettered  in  his  memory ;  and  more, 
she  had  worked  an  extraordinary  change  in  his  views  of 
life  and  aptitude  for  social  converse:  he  acknowledged  it 
with  genial  candour.  Through  her  he  was  encouraged, 
led,  excited  to  sparkle  with  the  witty,  feel  new  gifts,  or 
a  greater  breadth  of  nature ;  and  thanking  her,  he  became 
thirstily  susceptible  to  her  dark  beauty;  he  claimed  to 
have  found  the  key  of  her,  and  he  prized  it.  She  was  not 
passionless:  the  blood  flowed  warm.  Proud,  chaste,  she 
was  nobly  spirited;  having  an  intellectual  refuge  from  the 
besiegings  of  the  blood;  a  rock-fortress.  The  "wife  no 
wife  "  appeared  to  him,  striking  the  higher  elements  of  the 
man,  the  commonly  masculine  also.  —  Would  he  espouse 
her,  had  he  the  chance?  —  to-morrow!  this  instant!  With 
her  to  back  him,  he  would  be  doubled  in  manhood,  doubled 
in  brain  and  heart-energy.  To  call  her  wife,  spring  from 
her  and  return,  a  man  might  accept  his  fate  to  fight  Trojan 
or  Greek,  sure  of  his  mark  on  the  enemy. 

But  if,  after  all,  this  imputed  Helen  of  a  decayed  Paris 
passed,  submissive  to  the  legitimate  solicitor,  back  to  her 
husband  ? 

The  thought  shot  Dacier  on  his  legs  for  a  look  at  the 
blank  behind  him.  He  vowed  she  had  promised  it  should 
not  be.  Gould  it  ever  be,  after  the  ruin  the  meanly  sus- 
picious fellow  had  brought  upon  her?  —  Diana  voluntarily 
reunited  to  the  treacherous  cur? 

He  sat,  resolving  sombrely  that  if  the  debate  arose  he 
would  try  what  force  he  had  to  save  her  from  such  an 
ignominy,  and  dedicate  his  life  to  her,  let  the  world  wag 
its  tongue.     So  the  knot  would  be  cut. 

Men  unaccustomed  to  a  knot  in  their  system  find  the  pros- 
pect of  cutting  it  an  extreme  relief,  even  when  they  know 
that  the  cut  has  an  edge  to  wound  mortally  as  well  as 
pacify.  The  wound  was  not  heavy  payment  for  the  rap- 
ture of  having  so  incomparable  a  woman  his  own.  He 
reflected  wonderingly  on  the  husband,  as  he  had  previously 
done,  and  came  again  to  the  conclusion  that  it  was  a  poor 
creature,  abjectly  jealous  of  a  wife  he  could  neither  mas- 
ter, nor  equal,  nor  attract.  And  thinking  of  jealousy, 
Dacier  felt  none;  none  of  individuals,  only  of  facts:  her 
marriage,  her  bondage.     Her  condemnation  to  perpetual 


216  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

widowhood  angered  him,  as  at  an  unrighteous  decree. 
The  sharp  sweet  bloom  of  her  beauty,  fresh  in  swarthi- 
ness,  under  the  whipping  Easter,  cried  out  against  th^t 
loathed  inhumanity.     Or  he  made  it  cry. 

Being  a  stranger  to  the  jealousy  of  men,  he  took  the  soft 
assurance  that  he  was  preferred  above  them  all.  Com- 
petitors were  numerous :  not  any  won  her  eyes  as  he  did. 
She  revealed  nothing  of  the  same  pleasures  in  the  shining 
of  the  others  touched  by  her  magical  wand.  Would  she 
have  pardoned  one  of  them  the  "  Diana ! "  bursting  from 
his  mouth? 

She  was  not  a  woman  for  trifling,  still  less  for  secresy. 
He  was  as  little  the  kind  of  lover.  Both  would  be  ready 
to  take  up  their  burden,  if  the  burden  was  laid  on  them. 
—  Diana  had  thus  far  impressed  him. 

Meanwhile  he  faced  the  cathedral  towers  of  the  ancient 
Norman  city,  standing  up  in  the  smoky  hues  of  the  West; 
and  a  sentence  out  of  her  book  seemed  fitting  to  the  scene 
and  what  he  felt.  He  rolled  it  over  luxuriously  as  the 
next  of  delights  to  having  her  beside  him.  — She  wrote  of 
*'  Thoughts  that  are  hare  dark  outli?ies,  coloured  by  some  old 
passion  of  the  soul,  like  towers  of  a  distant  city  seen  in  the 
funeral  waste  of  day.''  —  His  bluff  English  anti-poetic 
training  would  have  caused  him  to  shrug  at  the  stuff  com- 
ing from  another  pen:  he  might  condescendingly  have 
criticized  it,  with  a  sneer  embalmed  in  humour.  The 
words  were  hers ;  she  had  written  them ;  almost  by  a  sort 
of  anticipation,  he  imagined ;  for  he  at  once  fell  into  the 
mood  they  suggested,  and  had  a  full  crop  of  the  "bare 
dark  outlines  "  of  thoughts  coloured  by  his  particular  form 
of  passion. 

Diana  had  impressed  him  powerfully  when  she  set  him 
swallowing  and  assimilating  a  sentence  ethereally  thin  in 
substance,  of  mere  sentimental  significance,  that  he  would 
antecedently  have  read  aloud  in  a  drawing-room,  picking 
up  the  book  by  hazard,  as  your  modern  specimen  of  roman- 
tic vapouring.  Mr.  Dacier  however  was  at  the  time  in 
observation  of  the  towers  of  Caen,  fresh  from  her  presence, 
animated  to  some  conception  of  her  spirit.  He  drove  into 
the  streets,  desiring,  half  determining,  to  risk  a  drive  back 
on  the  morrow. 


A  VISIT  TO  DIANA  217 

The  cold  light  of  the  morrow  combined  with  his  fear  of 
distressing  her  to  restrain  him.  Perhaps  he  thought  it 
well  not  to  risk  his  gains.  He  was  a  northerner  in  blood. 
He  may  have  thought  it  well  not  further  to  run  the  per- 
sonal risk  immediately. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 


RECORDS   A   VISIT    TO    DIANA    FROM    ONE    OP     THE    WORLD^S 

GOOD    WOMEN 

Pure  disengagement  of  contemplativeness  had  selected 
Percy  Dacier  as  the  model  of  her  Young  Minister  of 
State,  Diana  supposed.  Could  she  otherwise  have  dared 
to  sketch  him  ?     She  certainly  would  not  have  done  it  now. 

That  was  a  reflection  similar  to  what  is  entertained  by 
one  who  has  dropped  from  a  precipice  to  the  midway  ledge 
over  the  abyss,  where  caution  of  the  whole  sensitive  being 
is  required  for  simple  self-preservation.  How  could  she 
have  been  induced  to  study  and  portray  him !  It  seemed 
a  form  of  dementia. 

She  thought  this  while  imagining  the  world  to  be  inter- 
rogating her.  When  she  interrogated  herself,  she  flew  to 
Lugano  and  her  celestial  Salvatore,  that  she  might  be  de- 
fended from  a  charge  of  the  dreadful  weakness  of  her  sex. 
Surely  she  there  had  proof  of  her  capacity  for  pure  disen- 
gagement. Even  in  recollection  the  springs  of  spiritual 
happiness  renewed  the  bubbling  crystal  play.  She  believed 
that  a  divineness  had  wakened  in  her  there,  to  strengthen 
her  to  the  end,  ward  her  from  any  complicity  in  her^sex's 
culprit  blushing. 

Dacier's  cry  of  her  name  was  the  cause,  she  chose  to 
think,  of  the  excessive  circumspection  she  must  henceforth 
practise;  precariously  footing,  embracing  hardest  earth,  the 
plainest  rules,  to  get  back  to  safety.  Not  that  she  was  per- 
sonally  endangered,  or  at  least  not  spiritually ;  she  could 
always  fly  in  soul  to  her  heights.  But  she  had  now  to  be 
on  guard,  constantly  in  the  fencing  attitude.     And  watch- 


218  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

ful  of  herself  as  well.  That  was  admitted  with  a  ready- 
frankness,  to  save  it  from  being  a  necessitated  and  painful 
confession:  for  the  voluntary  acquiescence,  if  it  involved 
her  in  her  sex,  claimed  an  individual  exemption.  "  Women 
are  women,  and  I  am  a  woman:  but  I  am  I,  and  unlike 
them :  I  see  we  are  weak,  and  weakness  tempts :  in  owning 
the  prudence  of  guarded  steps,  I  am  armed.  It  is  by  dis- 
sembling, feigning  immunity,  that  we  are  imperilled."  She 
would  have  phrased  it  so,  with  some  anger  at  her  feminine 
nature  as  well  as  at  the  subjection  forced  on  her  by  circum- 
stances. 

Besides,  her  position  and  Percy  Dacier's  threw  the  fancied 
danger  into  remoteness.  The  world  was  her  stepmother, 
vigilant  to  become  her  judge ;  and  the  world  was  his  task- 
master, hopeful  of  him,  yet  able  to  strike  him  down  for  an 
offence.  She  saw  their  situation  as  he  did.  The  course  of 
folly  must  be  bravely  taken,  if  taken  at  all.  Disguise  de- 
graded her  to  the  reptiles. 

This  was  faced.  Consequently  there  was  no  fear  of  it. 
She  had  very  easily  proved  that  she  had  skill  and  self- 
possession  to  keep  him  rational,  and  therefore  they  could 
continue  to  meet.  A  little  outburst  of  frenzy  to  a  reputably 
handsome  woman  could  be  treated  as  the  froth  of  a  passing 
wave.     Men  have  the  trick,  infants  their  fevers. 

Diana's  days  were  spent  in  reasoning.  Her  nights  were 
not  so  tuneable  to  the  superior  mind.  When  asleep  she 
was  the  sport  of  elves  that  danced  her  into  tangles  too  deli- 
ciously  unravelled,  and  left  new  problems  for  the  wise-eyed 
and  anxious  morning.  She  solved  them  with  the  thought 
that  in  sleep  it  was  the  mere  ordinary  woman  who  fell  a 
prey  to  her  tormentors ;  awake,  she  dispersed  the  swarm, 
her  sky  was  clear.  Gradually  the  persecution  ceased,  thanks 
to  her  active  pen. 

A  letter  from  her  legal  adviser,  old  Mr.  Braddock,  in- 
formed her  that  no  grounds  existed  for  apprehending  mari- 
tal annoyance,  and  late  in  May  her  household  had  resumed 
its  customary  round. 

She  examined  her  accounts.  The  Debit  and  Credit  sides 
presented  much  of  the  appearance  of  male  and  female  in 
our  jog-trot  civilization.  They  matched  middling  well; 
with  rather  too  marked  a  tendency  to  strain  the  lea^h  and 


A  VISIT  TO  DIANA  219 

run  frolic  on  the  part  of  friend  Debit  (the  wanton  male) , 
which  deepened  the  blush  of  the  comparison.  Her  father 
had  noticed  the  same  funny  thing  in  his  effort  to  balance 
his  tugging  accounts :  ''  Now  then  for  a  look  at  Man  and 
Wife  r'''  except  that  he  made  Debit  stand  for  the  portly 
frisky  female,  Credit  the  decorous  and  contracted  other 
half,  a  prim  gentleman  of  a  constitutionally  lean  habit  of 
body,  remonstrating  with  her.  "  You  seem  to  forget  that 
we  are  married,  my  dear,  and  must  walk  in  step  or  bundle 
into  the  Bench,"  Dan  Merion  used  to  say. 

Diana  had  not  so  much  to  rebuke  in  Mr.  Debit ;  or  not  at 
the  iirst  reckoning.     But  his  ways  were  curious.     She  grew 
distrustful  of  him,  after  dismissing  him  with  a  quiet  ad- 
monition and  discovering  a  series  of  ambush  bills,  which  he 
must  have   been  aware  of  when  he   was  allowed  to   pass 
as  an  honourable  citizen.     His  answer  to  her  reproaches 
pleaded  the  necessitousness  of  his  purchases  and  expendi- 
ture:  a   capital  plea;  and   Mrs.  Credit  was   requested  by 
him,  in  a  courteous  manner,  to  drive  her  pen  the  faster,  so 
that  she  might  wax  to  a  corresponding  size  and  satisfy  the 
world's  idea  of  fitness  in  couples.     She  would  have  costly 
furniture,  because  it  pleased  her  taste ;  and  a  French  cook, 
for  a  like  reason,  in  justice  to  her  guests ;  and  trained  ser- 
vants; and  her  tribe  of  pensioners  ;  flowers  she  would  have 
profuse  and  fresh  at  her  windows  and  over  the  rooms ;  and 
the  pictures  and  engravings  on  the  walls  were  (always  for 
the  good  reason  mentioned)  choice  ones;  and  she  had  a 
love  of  old  lace,  she  loved  colours  as  she  loved  cheerfulness, 
and  silks,  and  satin  hangings,  Indian  ivory  carvings,  count- 
less mirrors,  Oriental  woods,  chairs  and  desks  with  some 
feature  or  a  flourish  in  them,  delicate  tables  with  antelope 
legs,  of  approved  workmanship  in  the  chronology  of  Euro- 
pean upholstery,  and  marble   clocks  of  cunning  device  to 
symbol  Time,  mantel-piece  decorations,  illustrated  editions 
of  her  favourite  authors ;  her  bed-chambers,  too,  gave  the 
nest  for  sleep  a  dainty  cosiness  in  aerial  draperies.     Hence, 
more  or  less  directly,  the  peccant  bills.     Credit  was  reduced 
to  reckon  to  a  nicety  the  amount  she  could  rely  on  posi- 
tively :  her  fixed  income  from  her  investments  and  the  let- 
ting of  The  Crossways :  the  days  of  half-yearly  payments 
that   would  magnify  her  to   some  proportions  beside  the 


220  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

alarming  growth  of  her  partner,  who  was  proud  of  it,  and 
referred  her  to  the  treasures  she  could  summon  with  her 
pen,  at  a  murmur  of  dissatisfaction.  His  compliments 
were  sincere;  they  were  seductive.  He  assured  her  that 
she  had  struck  a  rich  vein  in  an  inexhaustible  mine:  by 
writing  only  a  very  little  faster  she  could  double  her  in- 
come ;  counting  a  broader  popularity,  treble  it ;  and  so  on 
a  tide  of  success  down  the  widening  river  to  a  sea  sheer 
golden.  Behold  how  it  sparkles  !  Are  we  then  to  stint  our 
winged  hours  of  youth  for  want  of  courage  to  realize  the 
riches  we  can  command  ?  Debit  was  eloquent,  he  was  un- 
answerable. 

Another  calculator,  an  accustomed  and  lamentably-scru- 
pulous arithmetician,  had  been  at  work  for  some  time  upon 
a  speculative  summing  of  the  outlay  of  Diana's  establish- 
ment, as  to  its  chances  of  swamping  the  income.  Redworth 
could  guess  pretty  closely  the  cost  of  a  household,  if  his 
care  for  the  holder  set  him  venturing  on  averages.  He 
knew  nothing  of  her  ten  per  cent,  investment  and  con- 
sidered her  fixed  income  a  beggarly  regiment  to  marshal 
against  the  invader.  He  fancied  however,  in  his  ignorance 
of  literary  profits,  that  a  popular  writer,  selling  several 
editions,  had  come  to  an  El  Dorado.  There  was  the  mine. 
It  required  a  diligent  working.  Diana  was  often  struck  by 
hearing  Redworth  ask  her  when  her  next  book  might  be  ex- 
pected. He  appeared  to  have  an  eagerness  in  hurrying  her 
to  produce,  and  she  had  to  say  that  she  was  not  a  nimble 
writer.  His  flattering  impatience  was  vexatious.  He  ad- 
mired her  work,  yet  he  did  his  utmost  to  render  it  little 
admirable.  His  literary  taste  was  not  that  of  young  Arthur 
Rhodes,  to  whom  she  could  read  her  chapters,  appearing  to 
take  counsel  upon  them  while  drinking  the  eulogies  :  she 
suspected  him  of  prosaically  wishing  her  to  make  money, 
and  though  her  exchequer  was  beginning  to  know  the  need 
of  it,  the  author's  lofty  mind  disdained  such  sordidness :  — 
to  be  excused,  possibly,  for  a  failing  productive  energy. 
She  encountered  obstacles  to  imaginative  composition. 
With  the  pen  in  her  hand,  she  would  fall  into  heavy  mus- 
ings; break  a  sentence  to  muse,  and  not  on  the  subject. 
She  slept  unevenly  at  night,  was  drowsy  by  day,  unless  the 
open  air  was  about  her,  or  animating  friends.     Red  worth's 


A  VISIT  TO  DIANA  221 

urgency  to  get  her  to  publish  was  particularly  annoying 
when  she  felt  how  greatly  The  Young  Minister  of  State 
would  have  been  improved  had  she  retained  the  work  to 
brood  over  it,  polish,  re-write  passages,  perfect  it.  Her 
musings  embraced  long  dialogues  of  that  work,  never 
printed ;  they  sprang  up,  they  passed  from  memory ;  leav- 
ing a  distaste  for  her  present  work  :  The  Cantatrice  :  far 
more  poetical  than  the  preceding,  in  the  opinion  of  Arthur 
Rhodes ;  and  the  story  was  more  romantic ;  modelled  on 
a  Prima  Donna  she  had  met  at  the  musical  parties  of  Henry 
Wilmers,  after  hearing  Redworth  tell  of  Charles  Rainer's 
quaint  passion  for  the  woman,  or  the  idea  of  the  woman. 
Diana  had  courted  her,  studied  and  liked  her.  The  picture 
she  was  drawing  of  the  amiable  and  gifted  Italian,  of  her 
villain  Roumanian  husband,  and  of  the  eccentric,  high- 
minded,  devoted  Englishman,  was  good  in  a  fashion;  but 
considering  the  theme,  she  had  reasonable  apprehension 
that  her  Cantatrice  would  not  repay  her  for  the  time  and 
labour  bestowed  on  it.  No  clever  transcripts  of  the  dia- 
logue of  the  day  occurred ;  no  hair-breadth  ^scapes,  perils 
by  sea  and  land,  heroisms  of  the  hero,  fine  shrieks  of  the 
heroine ;  no  set  scenes  of  catching  pathos  and  humour ;  no 
distinguishable  points  of  social  satire  —  equivalent  to  a 
smacking  of  the  public  on  the  chaps,  which  excites  it  to 
grin  with  keen  discernment  of  the  author's  intention.  She 
did  not  appeal  to  the  senses  nor  to  a  superficial  discern- 
ment. So  she  had  the  anticipatory  sense  of  its  failure; 
and  she  wrote  her  best,  in  perverseness ;  of  course  she 
wrote  slowly;  she  wrote  more  and  more  realistically  of 
the  characters  and  the  downright  human  emotions,  less  of 
the  wooden  supernumeraries  of  her  stor}^,  labelled  for  broad 
guffaw  or  deluge  tears  —  the  grappling  natural  links  be- 
tween our  public  and  an  author.  Her  feelings  were  aloof. 
They  flowed  at  a  hint  of  a  scene  of  The  Young  Minister. 
She  could  not  put  them  into  The  Cantatrice.  And  Arthur 
Rhodes  pronounced  this  work  poetical  beyond  its  predeces- 
sors, for  the  reason  that  the  chief  characters  were  alive  and 
the  reader  felt  their  pulses.  He  meant  to  say,  they  were 
poetical  inasmuch  as  they  were  creations. 

The  slow  progress  of  a  work  not  driven  by  the  author's 
feelings  necessitated  frequent  consultations  between  Debit 


222  DIANA   OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

and  Credit,  resulting  in  altercations,  recriminations,  discord 
of  the  yoked  and  divergent  couple.     To  restore  them  to 
their  proi3er  trot  in  harness,  Diana  reluctantly  went  to  her 
publisher  for  an  advance  item  of  the  sum  she  was  to  receive, 
and  the  act  increased  her  distaste.     An  idea  came  that  she 
would  soon  cease  to  be  able  to  write  at  all.     What  then  ? 
Perhaps  by  selling  her  invested  money,  and  ultimately  The 
Crossways,  she  would  have  enough  for  her  term  upon  earth. 
Necessarily  she  had  to  think  that  short,  in  order  to  reckon 
it  as  nearly  enough.     "  I  am  sure,"  she  said  to  herself,  "  I 
shall  not  trouble  the  world  very  long."     A  strange  languor 
beset  her  ;  scarcely  melancholy,  for  she  conceived  the  cheer- 
fulness of  life  and  added  to  it  in  company  ;  but  a  nerveless- 
ness,  as  though  she  had  been  left  by  the  stream  on  the 
banks,  and  saw  beauty  and  pleasure  sweep  along  and  away, 
while  the  sun  that  primed  them  dried  her  veins.     At  this 
time  she  was  gaining  her  widest  reputation  for  brilliancy  of 
wit.     Only  to  welcome  guests  were  her  evenings  ever  spent 
at  home.    She  had  no  intimate  understanding  of  the  deadly 
wrestle  of  the  conventional  woman  with  her  nature  which 
she  was  undergoing  below  the  surface.     Perplexities  she 
acknowledged,  and  the  prudence  of  guardedness.     "But  as 
I  am  sure  not  to  live  very  long,  we  may  as  well  meet." 
Her  meetings  with   Percy  Dacier  were   therefore   hardly 
shunned,  and  his  behaviour  did  not  warn  her  to  discounte- 
nance them.    It  would  have  been  cruel  to  exclude  him  from 
her  select  little  dinners  of  eight.     Whitmonby,  Westlake, 
Henry  Wilmers  and  the  rest,  she  perhaps  aiding,  schooled 
him  in  the  conversational  art.     She  heard  it  said  of  him, 
that   the   courted   discarder  of  the  sex,  hitherto   a   mere 
politician,  was  wonderfully  humanized.     Lady  Pennon  fell 
to  talking  of  him  hopefully.     She  declared  him  to  be  one  of 
the  men  who  unfold  tardil}'',  and  only  await  the  mastering 
passion.     If  the  passion  had  come,  it  was  controlled.     His 
command  of  himself  melted  Diana.     How  could  she  forbid 
his  entry  to  the  houses  she  frequented  ?     She  was  glad  to 
see  him.     He  showed  his  pleasure  in  seeing  her.     Remem- 
bering his  tentative  indiscretion  on  those  foreign  sands,  she 
reflected  that  he  had  been  easily  checked :  and  the  like  was 
not  to  be  said  of  some  others.     Beautiful  women  in  her 
position  provoke  an  intemperateness  that  contrasts  touch- 


A  VISIT  TO  DIANA  223 

ingly  with  the  self-restraint  of  a  particular  admirer.  Her 
"  impassioned  Caledonian "  was  one  of  a  host,  to  speak  of 
whom  and  their  fits  of  lunacy  even  to  her  friend  Emma, 
was  repulsive.  She  bore  with  them,  foiled  them,  passed 
them,  and  recovered  her  equanimity  ;  but  the  contrast  called 
to  her  to  dwell  on  it,  the  self-restraint  whispered  of  a  depth 
of  passion.  .  .  . 

She  was  shocked  at  herself  for  a  singular  tremble  she 
experienced,  without  any  beating  of  the  heart,  on  hearing 
one  day  that  the  marriage  of  Percy  Dacier  and  Miss  Asper 
was  at  last  definitely  fixed.  Mary  Paynham  brought  her 
the  news.  She  had  it  from  a  lady  who  had  come  across 
Miss  Asper  at  Lady  Wathin's  assemblies,  and  considered 
the  great  heiress  extraordinarily  handsome. 

"A  golden  miracle,"  Diana  gave  her  words  to  say. 
"Good  looks  and  gold  together  are  rather  superhuman. 
The  report  may  be  this  time  true." 

Next  afternoon  the  card  of  Lady  Wathin  requested  Mrs. 
Warwick  to  grant  her  a  private  interview. 

Lady  Wathin,  as  one  of  the  order  of  women  who  can  do 
anything  in  a  holy  cause,  advanced  toward  Mrs.  Warwick, 
unabashed  by  the  burden  of  her  mission,  and  spinally  pre- 
pared, behind  benevolent  smilings,  to  repay  dignity  of  mien 
with  a  similar  erectness  of  dignity.  They  touched  fingers 
and  sat.  The  preliminaries  to  the  matter  of  the  interview 
were  brief  between  ladies  physically  sensible  of  antagonism 
and  mutually  too  scornful  of  subterfuges  in  one  another's 
i)resence  to  beat  the  bush. 

Lady  Wathin  began.     "I  am,  you  are  aware,  Mrs.  War- 
wick, a  cousin  of  your  friend  Lady  Dunstane." 
"  You  come  to  me  on  business  ?  "  Diana  said. 
"It  may  be  so  termed.     T  have  no  personal  interest  in  it. 
I  come  to  lay  certain  facts  before  you  which  I  think  you 
should  know.     We  think  it  better  that  an  acquaintance,  and 
one  of  your  sex,  should  state  the  case  to  you,  instead  of 
having  recourse  to  formal  intermediaries,  lawyers  ..." 
"  Lawyers  ?  " 

'*  Well,  my  husband  is  a  lawyer,  it  is  true.  In  the  course 
of  his  professional  vocations  he  became  acquainted  with 
Mr.  Warwick.  We  have  latterly  seen  a  good  deal  of  him. 
He  is,  I  regret  to  say,  seriously  unwell." 


224  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

*•  I  have  heard  of  it." 

"  He  has  no  female  relations,  it  appears.  He  needs  more 
care  than  he  can  receive  from  hirelings." 

"  Are  you  empowered  by  him,  Lady  Wathin  ?  '* 

"I  am,  Mrs.  Warwick.  We  will  not  waste  time  in 
apologies.  He  is  most  anxious  for  a  reconciliation.  It 
seems  to  Sir  Cramborne  and  to  me  the  most  desireable  thing 
for  all  parties  concerned,  if  you  can  be  induced  to  regard  it 
in  that  light.  Mr.  Warwick  may  or  may  not  live ;  but  the 
estrangement  is  quite  undoubtedly  the  cause  of  his  illness. 
I  touch  on  nothing  connected  with  it.  I  simply  wish  that 
you  should  not  be  in  ignorance  of  his  proposal  and  his 
condition." 

Diana  bowed  calmly.  ^^I  grieve  at  his  condition.  His 
proposal  has  already  been  made  and  replied  to." 

"  Oh,  but,  Mrs.  Warwick,  an  immediate  and  decisive 
refusal  of  a  proposal  so  fraught  with  consequences !  .  .  .  " 

"Ah,  but.  Lady  Wathin,  you  are  now  outstepping  the 
limits  prescribed  by  the  office  you  have  undertaken." 

^'  You  will  not  lend  ear  to  an  intercession  ?  " 

"  I  will  not." 

"Of  course,  Mrs.  Warwick,  it  is  not  for  me  to  hint  at 
things  that  lawyers  could  say  on  the  subject." 

"  Your  forbearance  is  creditable.  Lady  Wathin." 

"  Believe  me,  Mrs.  Warwick,  the  step  is  —  I  speak  in 
my  husband's  name  as  well  as  my  own  —  strongly  to  be 
advised." 

"  If  I  hear  one  word  more  of  it,  I  leave  the  country." 

"I  should  be  sorry  indeed  at  any  piece  of  rashness 
depriving  your  numerous  friends  of  your  society.  We 
have  recently  become  acquainted  with  Mr.  Eedworth,  and 
I  know  the  loss  you  would  be  to  them.  I  have  not 
attempted  an  appeal  to  your  feelings,  Mrs.  Warwick." 

"  I  thank  you  warmly,  Lady  Wathin,  for  what  you  have 
not  done." 

The  aristocratic  airs  of  Mrs.  Warwick  were  annoying  to 
Lady  Wathin  when  she  considered  that  they  were  borrowed, 
and  that  a  pattern  morality  could  regard  the  woman  as 
ostracized:  nor  was  it  agreeable  to  be  looked  at  through 
eyelashes  under  partially  lifted  brows.  She  had  come  to 
appeal  to  the  feelings  of  the  wife ;  at  any  rate,  to  discover 
if  she  had  some  and  was  better  than  a  wild  adventuress. 


A  VISIT  TO  DIANA  225 

"  Our  life  below  is  short ! "  she  said.  To  which  Diana 
tacitly  assented. 

"We  have  our  little  term,  Mrs.  Warwick.  It  is  soon 
over.'' 

"  On  the  other  hand,  the  platitudes  concerning  it  are 
eternal." 

Lady  Wathin  closed  her  eyes,  that  the  like  effect  might 
be  produced  on  her  ears.  "  Ah  !  they  are  the  truths.  But 
it  is  not  my  business  to  preach.  Permit  me  to  say  that  I 
feel  deeply  for  your  husband.'* 

"  I  am  glad  of  Mr.  Warwick's  having  friends ;  and  they  are 
many,  I  hope." 

"  They  cannot  behold  him  perishing,  without  an  effort  on 
his  behalf." 

A  chasm  of  silence  intervened.  Wifely  pity  was  not 
sounded  in  it. 

"  He  will  question  me,  Mrs.  Warwick." 

"  You  can  report  to  him  the  heads  of  our  conversation, 
Lady  Wathin." 

"  Would  you  —  it  is  your  husband's  most  earnest  wish  ;  and 
our  house  is  open  to  his  wife  and  to  him  for  the  purpose  ; 
and  it  seems  to  us  that  .  .  .  indeed  it  might  avert  a  catas- 
trophe you  would  necessarily  deplore  :  —  would  you  consent 
to  meet  him  at  my  house  ?  " 

"  It  has  already  been  asked,  Lady  Wathin,  and  refused." 

*'  But  at  my  house  —  under  our  auspices  !  " 

Diana  glanced  at  the  clock.     "  Nowhere." 

''Is  it  not  —  pardon  me  —  a  wife's  duty,  Mrs.  Warwick, 
at  least  to  listen  ?  " 

"Lady  Wathin,  I  have  listened  to  you." 

"  In  the  case  of  his  extreme  generosity  so  putting  it,  for 
the  present,  Mrs.  Warwick,  that  he  asks  only  to  be  heard 
personally  by  his  wife !     It  may  preclude  so  much." 

Diana  felt  a  hot  wind  across  her  skin. 

She  smiled  and  said  :  "  Let  me  thank  you  for  bringing 
to  an  end  a  mission  that  must  have  been  unpleasant  to 
you." 

"  But  you  will  meditate  on  it,  Mrs.  Warwick,  will  you  not  ? 
Give  me  that  assurance  !  " 

"  I  shall  not  forget  it,"  said  Diana. 

Again  the  ladies  touched  fingers,  \rith  an  interchange  of 

15 


226  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

the  social  grimace  of  cordiality.  A  few  words  of  com- 
passion for  poor  Lady  Dunstane's  invalided  state  covered 
Lady  Wathin's  retreat. 

She  left,  it  struck  her  ruffled  sentiments,  an  icy  libertine, 
"whom  any  husband  caring  for  his  dignity  and  comfort  was 
well  rid  of ;  and  if  only  she  could  have  contrived  allusively 
to  bring  in  the  name  of  Mr.  Percy  Dacier,  just  to  show  these 
arrant  coquettes,  or  worse,  that  they  were  not  quite  so 
privileged  to  pursue  their  intrigues  obscurely  as  they 
imagined,  it  would  have  soothed  her  exasperation. 

She  left  a  woman  the  prey  of  panic. 

Diana  thought  of  Emma  and  Redworth,  and  of  their 
foolish  interposition  to  save  her  character  and  keep  her 
bound.  She  might  now  have  been  free!  The  struggle 
with  her  manacles  reduced  her  to  a  state  of  rebelliousness, 
from  which  issued  vivid  illuminations  of  the  one  means  of 
certain  escape :  an  abhorrent  hissing  cavern,  that  led  to  a 
place  named  Liberty,  her  refuge,  but  a  hectic  place. 

Unable  to  write,  hating  the  house  which  held  her  a  fixed 
mark  for  these  attacks,  she  had  an  idea  of  flying  straight 
to  her  beloved  Lugano  lake,  and  there  hiding,  abandoning 
her  friends,  casting  off  the  slave's  name  she  bore,  and 
living  free  in  spirit.  She  went  so  far  as  to  reckon  the  cost 
of  a  small  household  there,  and  justify  the  violent  step 
by  an  exposition  of  retrenchment  upon  her  large  London 
expenditure.  She  had  but  to  say  farewell  to  Emma,  no 
other  tie  to  cut!  One  morning  on  the  Salvatore  heights 
would  wash  her  clear  of  the  webs  defacing  and  entangling 
her. 


CHAPTEE  XXIV 

INDICATES    A   SOUL    PREPARED    FOR    DESPERATION 

The  month  was  August,  four  days  before  the  closing  of 
Parliament,  and  Diana  fancied  it  good  for  Arthur  Rhodes 
to  run  down  with  her  to  Copsley.  He  came  to  her  invita- 
tion joyfully,  reminding  her  of  Lady  Dunstane's  wish  to 
hear  some  chapters  of  The  Cantatrice,  and  the  MS.  was 


A   SOUL   PREPARED   FOR    DESPERATION  221 

packed.  They  started,  taking  rail  and  fly,  and  winding  up 
the  distance  on  foot.  August  is  the  month  of  sober  matur- 
ity and  majestic  foliage,  songless,  but  a  crowned  and  royal- 
robed  queenly  month  ;  and  the  youngster's  appreciation  of 
the  homely  scenery  refreshed  Diana ;  his  delight  in  being 
with  her  was  also  pleasant.  She  had  no  wish  to  exchange 
him  for  another ;  and  that  was  a  strengthening  thought. 

At  Copsley  the  arrival  of  their  luggage  had  prepared  the 
welcome.  Warm  though  it  was,  Diana  perceived  a  change 
in  Emma,  an  unwonted  reserve,  a  doubtfulness  of  her  eyes, 
in  spite  of  tenderness  ;  and  thus  thrown  back  on  herself, 
thinking  that  if  she  had  followed  her  own  counsel  (as  she 
called  her  impulse)  in  old  days,  there  would  have  been  no 
such  present  misery,  she  at  once,  and  unconsciously,  as- 
sumed a  guarded  look.  Based  on  her  knowledge  of  her 
honest  footing,  it  was  a  little  defiant.  Secretly  in  her 
bosom  it  was  sharpened  to  a  slight  hostility  by  the  knowl- 
edge that  her  mind  had  been  straying.  The  guilt  and  the 
innocence  combined  to  clothe  her  in  mail,  the  innocence 
being  positive,  the  guilt  so  vapoury.  But  she  was  armed 
only  if  necessary,  and  there  was  no  requirement  for  armour. 
Emma  did  not  question  at  all.  She  saw  the  alteration  in 
her  Tony  :  she  was  too  full  of  the  tragic  apprehensiveness 
overmastering  her  to  speak  of  trifles.  She  had  never 
confided  to  Tony  the  exact  nature  and  the  growth  of 
her  malady,  thinking  it  mortal,  and  fearing  to  alarm  her 
dearest. 

A  portion  of  the  manuscript  was  read  out  by  Arthur 
Rhodes  in  the  evening;  the  remainder  next  morning. 
Redworth  perceptibly  was  the  model  of  the  English  hero  ; 
and  as  to  his  person,  no  friend  could  complain  of  the  sketch  ; 
his  clear-eyed  heartiness,  manliness,  wholesomeness  —  a 
word  of  Lady  Dunstane's  regarding  him,  —  and  his  hand- 
some braced  figure,  were  well  painted.  Emma  forgave  the 
insistence  on  a  certain  bluntness  of  the  nose,  in  consideration 
of  the  fond  limning  of  his  honest  and  expressive  eyes,  and 
the  "light  on  his  temples,"  which  they  had  noticed  together. 

She  could  not  so  easily  forgive  the  realistic  picture  of  the 
man :  an  exaggeration,  she  thought,  of  small  foibles,  that 
even  if  they  existed,  should  not  have  been  stressed.  The 
turn   for  '^calculating"  was  shown  up  ridiculously;    Mr. 


228  DIANA   OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

Cuthbert  Dering  was  calculating  in  his  impassioned  moods 
as  well  as  in  his  cold.  His  head  was  a  long  division  of 
ciphers.  He  had  statistics  for  spectacles,  and  beheld  the 
world  through  them,  and  the  mistress  he  worshipped. 

"I  see,"  said  Emma,  during  a  pause;  "he  is  a  Saxon. 
You  still  affect  to  have  the  race  en  grippe,  Tony." 

"  I  give  him  every  credit  for  what  he  is,"  Diana  replied. 
"  I  admire  the  finer  qualities  of  the  race  as  much  as  anyone. 
You  want  to  have  them  presented  to  you  in  enamel, 
Emmy." 

But  the  worst  was  an  indication  that  the  mania  for  cal- 
culating in  and  out  of  season  would  lead  to  the  catastrophe 
destructive  of  his  happiness.  Emma  could  not  bear  that. 
Without  asking  herself  whether  it  could  be  possible  that 
Tony  knew  the  secret,  or  whether  she  would  have  laid  it 
bare,  her  sympathy  for  Redworth  revolted  at  the  exposure. 
She  was  chilled.  She  let  it  pass ;  she  merely  said :  "  I 
like  the  writing." 

Diana  understood  that  her  story  was  condemned. 

She  put  on  her  robes  of  philosophy  to  cloak  discourage- 
ment.    "  I  am  glad  the  writing  pleases  you." 

"  The  characters  are  as  true  as  life ! "  cried  Arthur 
Rhodes.  "  The  Cantatrice  drinking  porter  from  the  pewter 
at  the  slips  after  harrowing  the  hearts  of  her  audience,  is 
dearer  to  me  than  if  she  had  tottered  to  a  sofa  declining 
sustenance  ;  and  because  her  creatrix  has  infused  such 
blood  of  life  into  her  that  you  accept  naturally  whatever 
she  does.  She  was  exhausted,  and  required  the  porter,  like 
a  labourer  in  the  cornfield." 

Emma  looked  at  him,  and  perceived  the  poet  swamped 
by  the  admirer.  Taken  in  conjunction  with  Mr.  Cuthbert 
Dering's  frenzy  for  calculating,  she  disliked  the  incident  of 
the  porter  and  the  pewter. 

''While  the  Cantatrice  swallowed  her  draught,  I  suppose 
Mr.  Dering  counted  the  cost  ?  "  she  said. 

"  It  really  might  be  hinted,"  said  Diana. 

The  discussion  closed  with  the  accustomed  pro  and  con 
upon  the  wart  of  Cromwell's  nose,  Eealism  rejoicing  in  it, 
Idealism  objecting. 

Arthur  Rhodes  was  bidden  to  stretch  his  legs  on  a  walk 
along  the  heights  in  the  afternoon,  and  Emma  was  further 


A   SOUL  PREPARED  FOR  DESPERATION  229 

vexed  by  hearing  Tony  complain  of  Ked\vorth.'s  treatment 
of  the  lad,  whom  he  would  not  assist  to  any  of  the  snug 
little  posts  he  was  notoriously  able  to  dispense. 

"He  has  talked  of  Mr.  Khodes  to  me,"  said  Emma. 
"He  thinks  the  profession  of  literature  a  delusion,  and 
doubts  the  wisdom  of  having  poets  for  clerks." 

"John-Bullish!"  Diana  exclaimed.  "He  speaks  con- 
temptuously of  the  poor  boy." 

"  Only  inasmuch  as  the  foolishness  of  the  young  man  in 
throwing  up  the  Law  provokes  his  practical  mind  to  speak." 

"  He  might  take  my  word  for  the  '  young  man's  '  ability. 
I  want  him  to  have  the  means  of  living,  that  he  may  write. 
He  has  genius." 

"  He  may  have  it.  I  like  him,  and  have  said  so.  If  he 
were  to  go  back  to  his  lawstool,  I  have  no  doubt  that  Red- 
worth  would  manage  to  help  him." 

^'And  make  a  worthy  ancient  Braddock  of  a  youth  of 
splendid  promise  !     Have  I  sketched  him  too  Saxon  ?  " 

"  It  is  the  lens,  and  not  the  tribe,  Tony." 

The  Cantatrice  was  not  alluded  to  any  more;  but 
Emma's  disapproval  blocked  the  current  of  composition, 
already  subject  to  chokings  in  the  brain  of  the  author. 
Diana  stayed  three  days  at  Copsley,  one  longer  than  she 
had  intended,  so  that  Arthur  Ehodes  might  have  his  fill  of 
country  air. 

"  I  would  keep  him,  but  I  should  be  no  companion  for 
him,"  Emma  said. 

"  I  suspect  the  gallant  squire  is  only  to  be  satisfied  by 
landing  me  safely,"  said  Diana,  and  that  small  remark 
grated,  though  Emma  saw  the  simple  meaning.  When 
they  parted,  she  kissed  her  Tony  many  times.  Tears  were 
in  her  eyes.  It  seemed  to  Diana  that  she  was  anxious  to 
make  amends  for  the  fit  of  alienation,  and  she  was  kissed 
in  return  warmly,  quite  forgiven,  notwithstanding  the 
deadly  blank  she  had  caused  in  the  imagination  of  the 
writer  for  pay,  distracted  by  the  squabbles  of  Debit  and 
Credit. 

Diana  chatted  spiritedly  to  young  Rhodes  on  their  drive 
to  the  train.  She  was  profoundly  discouraged  by  Emma's 
disapproval  of  her  work.  It  wanted  but  that  one  drop  to 
make  a  recurrence  to  the  work  impossible.     There  it  must 


230  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

lie !  And  what  of  the  aspects  of  her  household  ?  —  Per- 
haps, after  all,  the  Redworths  of  the  world  are  right,  and 
Literature  as  a  profession  is  a  delusive  pursuit.  She  did 
not  assent  to  it  without  hostility  to  the  world's  Redworths. 

"They  have  no  sensitiveness,  we  have  too  much.     We 

are  made  of  bubbles  that  a  wind  will  burst,  and  as  the 
wind  is  always  blowing,  your  practical  Eedworths  have 
their  crow  of  us." 

She  suggested  advice  to  Arthur  Ehodes  upon  the  pru- 
dence of  his  resuming  the  yoke  of  the  Law. 

He  laughed  at  such  a  notion,  saying  that  he  had  some 
expectations  of  money  to  come. 

"  But  I  fear,"  said  he,  "  that  Lady  Dunstane  is  very  very 
ill.     She  begged  me  to  keep  her  informed  of  your  address." 

Diana  told  him  he  was  one  of  those  who  should  know  it 
whithersoever  she  went.  She  spoke  impulsively,  her  sen- 
timents of  friendliness  for  the  youth  being  temporarily 
brightened  by  the  strangeness  of  Emma's  conduct  in  de- 
puting it  to  him  to  fulfil  a  duty  she  had  never  omitted. 
"  What  can  she  think  I  am  going  to  do !  " 

On  her  table  at  home  lay  a  letter  from  Mr.  Warwick. 
She  read  it  hastily  in  the  presence  of  Arthur  Ehodes, 
having  at  a  glance  at  the  handwriting  anticipated  the  pro- 
posal it  contained  and  the  official  phrasing. 

Her  gallant  squire  was  invited  to  dine  with  her  that 
evening,  costume  excused. 

They  conversed  of  Literature  as  a  profession,  of  poets 
dead  and  living,  of  politics,  which  he  abhorred  and  shied 
at,  and  of  his  prospects.  He  wrote  many  rejected  pages, 
enjoyed  an  income  of  eighty  pounds  per  annum,  and  eked 
out  a  subsistence  upon  the  modest  sum  his  pen  procured 
him  ;  a  sum  extremely  insignificant ;  but  great  Nature  was 
his  own,  the  world  was  tributary  to  him,  the  future  his 
bejewelled  and  expectant  bride.  Diana  envied  his  youth- 
fulness.  Nothing  is  more  enviable,  nothing  richer  to  the 
mind,  than  the  aspect  of  a  cheerful  poverty.  How  much 
nobler  it  was,  contrasted  with  Eedworth's  amassing  of 
wealth ! 

When  alone,  she  went  to  her  bedroom  and  tried  to  write, 
tried  to  sleep.  Mr.  Warwick's  letter  was  looked  at.  It 
Beemed  to  indicate  a  threat  j   but  for  the  moment  it  did  not 


A  SOUL  PREPARED  FOR  DESPERATION  231 

disturb  her  so  much,  as  the  review  of  her  moral  prostratioric 
She  wrote  some  lines  to  her  lawyers,  quoting  one  of  Mr. 
"Warwick's  sentences.  That  done,  his  letter  was  dismissed. 
Her  intolerable  languor  became  alternately  a  defeating 
drowsiness  and  a  fever.  She  succeeded  in  the  effort  to 
smother  the  absolute  cause :  it  was  not  suffered  to  show  a 
front ;  at  the  cost  of  her  knowledge  of  a  practised  self- 
deception.  '^  I  wonder  whether  the  world  is  as  bad  as  a 
certain  class  of  writers  tell  us!"  she  sighed  in  weariness, 
and  mused  on  their  soundings  and  probings  of  poor  hu- 
manity, which  the  world  accepts  for  the  very  bottom-truth 
if  their  dredge  brings  up  sheer  refuse  of  the  abominable. 
The  world  imagines  those  to  be  at  our  nature's  depths  who 
are  impudent  enough  to  expose  its  muddy  shallows.  She 
was  in  the  mood  for  such  a  kind  of  writing :  she  could 
have  started  on  it  at  once  but  that  the  theme  was  wanting ; 
and  it  may  count  on  popularity,  a  great  repute  for  penetra- 
tion. It  is  true  of  its  kind,  though  the  dredging  of  nature 
is  the  miry  form  of  art.  When  it  flourishes  we  may  be 
assured  we  have  been  overenamelling  the  higher  forms. 
She  felt,  and  shuddered  to  feel,  that  she  could  draw 
from  dark  stores.  Hitherto  in  her  works  it  had  been 
a  triumph  of  the  good.  They  revealed  a. gaping  deficiency 
of  the  subtle  insight  she  now  possessed.  ''Exhibit  hu- 
manity as  it  is,  wallowing,  sensual,  wicked,  behind  the 
mask,'^  a  voice  called  to  her ;  she  was  allured  by  the  con- 
templation of  the  wide-mouthed  old  dragon  Ego,  whose 
portrait,  decently  painted,  establishes  an  instant  touch  of 
exchange  between  author  and  public,  the  latter  detected 
and  confessing.  Next  to  the  pantomime  of  Humour  and 
Pathos,  a  cynical  surgical  knife  at  the  human  bosom 
seems  the  surest  talisman  for  this  agreeable  exchange  ;  and 
she  could  cut.  She  gave  herself  a  taste  of  her  powers. 
She  cut  at  herself  mercilessly,  and  had  to  bandage  the 
wound  in  a  hurry  to  keep  in  life. 

Metaphors  were  her  refuge.  Metaphorically  she  could 
allow  her  mind  to  distinguish  the  struggle  she  was  under- 
going, sinking  under  it.  The  banished  of  Eden  had  to  put 
on  metaphors,  and  the  common  use  of  them  has  helped  largely 
to  civilize  us.  The  sluggish  in  intellect  detest  them,  but  our 
civilization  is  not  much  indebted  to   that  major  faction. 


232  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Especially  are  they  needed  by  the  pedestalled  woman  in  her 
conflict  with  the  natural.  Diana  saw  herself  through  the 
haze  she  conjured  up.  "  Am  I  worse  than  other  women  ?  " 
was  a  piercing  twi-thought.  Worse,  would  be  hideous  iso- 
lation. The  not  worse,  abased  her  sex.  She  could  afford 
to  say  that  the  world  was  bad  :  not  that  women  were. 

Sinking  deeper,  an  anguish  of  humiliation  smote  her  to  a 
sense  of  drowning.  For  what  if  the  poetic  ecstasy  on  her 
Salvatore  heights  had  not  been  of  origin  divine  ?  had  sprung 
from  other  than  spiritual  founts  ?  had  sprung  from  the  red- 
dened sources  she  was  compelled  to  conceal  ?  Could  it  be  ? 
She  would  not  believe  it.  But  there  was  matter  to  clip  her 
wings,  quench  her  light,  in  the  doubt. 

She  fell  asleep  like  the  wrecked  flung  ashore. 

Danvers  entered  her  room  at  an  early  hour  for  London  to 
inform  her  that  Mr.  Percy  Dacier  was  below,  and  begged 
permission  to  wait. 

Diana  gave  orders  for  breakfast  to  be  proposed  to  him. 
She  lay  staring  at  the  wall  until  it  became  too  visibly  a  re- 
flection of  her  mind. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

ONCE  MORE  THE  CROSSWAYS  AND  A  CHANGE  OF  TURNINGS 

The  suspicion  of  his  having  come  to  impart  the  news  of 
his  proximate  marriage  ultimately  endowed  her  with  sover- 
eign calmness.  She  had  need  to  think  it,  and  she  did.  Tea 
was  brought  to  her  while  she  dressed ;  she  descended  the 
stairs  revolving  phrases  of  happy  congratulation  and  the 
world's  ordinary  epigrams  upon  the  marriage-tie,  neatly 
mixed. 

They  read  in  one  another's  faces  a  different  meaning  from 
the  empty  words  of  excuse  and  welcome.  Dacier's  expressed 
the  buckling  of  a  strong  set  purpose ;  but,  grieved  by  the 
look  of  her  eyes,  he  wasted  a  moment  to  say  :  "  You  have 
not  slept.     You  have  heard  ?  .  .  ." 

"  What  ?  "  said  she,  trying  to  speculate  ;  and  that  was  a 
suflB-cient  answer. 


A  CHANGE  OP  TURNINGS  233 

"I  hadn't  the  courage  to  call  last  night;  I  passed  the 
windows.     Give  me  your  hand,  I  beg." 

She  gave  her  hand  in  wonderment,  and  more  wonder- 
ingly  felt  it  squeezed.  Her  heart  began  the  hammer- 
thump.  She  spoke  an  unintelligible  something ;  saw  herself 
melting  away  to  utter  weakness  —  pride,  reserve,  simple 
prudence,  all  going ;  crumbled  ruins  where  had  stood  a  for- 
tress imposing  to  men.  Was  it  love  ?  Her  heart  thumped 
shiveringly. 

He  kept  her  hand,  indifferent  to  the  gentle  tension. 
"  This  is  the  point :  I  cannot  live  without  you.     I  have 
gone  on  .  .  .  Who  was  here  last  night  ?     Forgive  me." 
"You  know  Arthur  Rhodes." 

"  I  saw  him  leave  the  door  at  eleven.  Why  do  you  torture 
me  ?  There  's  no  time  to  lose  now.  You  will  be  claimed. 
Come,  and  let  us  two  cut  the  knot.  It  is  the  best  thing  in 
the  world  for  me  —  the  only  thing.  Be  brave  !  I  have  your 
hand.  Give  it  for  good,  and  for  heaven's  sake  don't  play 
the  sex.  Be  yourself.  Dear  soul  of  a  woman !  I  never  saw 
the  soul  in  one  but  in  you.  I  have  waited  :  nothing  but  the 
dread  of  losing  you  sets  me  speaking  now.  And  for  you  to 
be  sacrificed  a  second  time  to  that  —  !  Oh,  no  !  You  know 
you  can  trust  me.  On  my  honour,  I  take  breath  from  you. 
You  are  my  better  in  everything  —  guide,  goddess,  dearest 
heart !    Trust  me ;  make  me  master  of  your  fate." 

"  But  my  friend !  "  the  murmur  hung  in  her  throat.  He 
was  marvellously  transformed  ;  he  allowed  no  space  for  the 
arts  of  defence  and  evasion. 

"  I  wish  I  had  the  trick  of  courting.  There  's  not  time  ; 
and  I'm  a  simpleton  at  the  game.  We  can  start  this  even- 
ing. Once  away,  we  leave  it  to  them  to  settle  the  matter, 
and  then  you  are  free,  and  mine  to  the  death." 

"  But  speak,  speak !     What  is  it  ?  "  Diana  said. 

"  That  if  we  delay,  I  'm  in  danger  of  losing  you 
altogether." 

Her  eyes  lightened :  "You  mean  that  you  have  heard  he 
has  determined?  ..." 

"  There  's  a  process  of  the  law.  But  stop  it.  Just  this 
one  step,  and  it  ends.  Whether  intended  or  not,  it  hangs 
over  you,  and  you  will  be  perpetually  tormented.  Why 
waste  your  whole  youth  ?  —  and  mine  as  well  !     For  I  am 


2S4  DIAKA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

bound  to  you  as  much  as  if  we  had  stood  at  the  altar  —  where 
we  will  stand  together  the  instant  you  are  free." 

"  But  where  have  you  heard  ?  "  .  .  . 

"  From  an  intimate  friend.  I  will  tell  you  —  sufficiently 
intimate  —  from  Lady  Wathin.  Nothing  of  a  friend,  but  I 
see  this  woman  at  times.  She  chose  to  speak  of  it  to 
me  —  it  does  n't  matter  why.  She  is  in  his  confidence,  and 
pitched  me  a  whimpering  tale.  Let  those  people  chatter. 
But  it 's  exactly  for  those  people  that  you  are  hanging  in 
chains,  all  your  youth  shrivelling.  Let  them  shout  their 
worst !  It 's  the  bark  of  a  day ;  and  you  won't  hear  it ; 
half  a  year,  and  it  will  be  over,  and  I  shall  bring  you 
back  —  the  husband  of  the  noblest  bride  in  Christendom ! 
You  don't  mistrust  me  ?  " 

"  It  is  not  that,"  said  she.  "  But  now  drop  my  hand.  I 
am  imprisoned." 

"It's  asking  too  much.  I've  lost  you  too  many  times. 
I  have  the  hand  and  I  keep  it.  I  take  nothing  but  the 
hand.  It's  the  hand  I  want.  I  give  you  mine.  I  love 
you.  Now  I  know  what  love  is !  —  and  the  word  carries 
nothing  of  its  weight.  Tell  me  you  do  not  doubt  my 
honour." 

"  Not  at  all.  But  be  rational.  I  must  think,  and  I  can- 
not while  you  keep  my  hand." 

He  kissed  it.     "  I  keep  my  own  against  the  world.'' 

A  cry  of  rebuke  swelled  to  her  lips  at  his  conqueror's 
tone.  It  was  not  uttered,  for  directness  was  in  his  char- 
acter and  his  wooing  loyal  —  save  for  bitter  circumstances, 
delicious  to  hear;  and  so  narrow  was  the  ring  he  had 
wound  about  her  senses,  that  her  loathing  of  the  circum- 
stances pushed  her  to  acknowledge  within  her  bell  of  a 
heart  her  love  for  him. 

He  was  luckless  enough  to  say :  "  Diana  !  " 

It  rang  horridly  of  her  husband.  She  drew  her  hand  to 
loosen  it,  with  repulsing  brows.     "  Not  that  name  ! " 

Dacier  was  too  full  of  his  honest  advocacy  of  the 
passionate  lover  to  take  a  rebuff.  There  lay  his  uncon- 
scious mastery,  where  the  common  arts  of  attack  would 
have  tripped  him  with  a  quick-witted  woman,  and  where  a 
man  of  passion,  not  allowing  her  to  succumb  in  dignity, 
would  have  alarmed  her  to  the  breaking  loose  from  him. 


A  CHANGE  OF  TURNINGS  235 

"  Lady  Dunstane  calls  you  Tony.*' 

*'  She  is  my  dearest  and  oldest  friend." 

"  You  and  I  don't  count  by  years.  You  are  tlie  dearest 
to  me  on  earth,  Tony  !  " 

She  debated  as  to  forbidding  that  name. 

The  moment's  pause  wrapped  her  in  a  mental  hurricane, 
out  of  which  she  came  with  a  heart  stopped,  her  olive 
cheeks  ashen-hued.  She  had  seen  that  the  step  was 
possible. 

"  Oh !  Percy,  Percy,  are  we  mad  ?  " 

*'  Not  mad.  We  take  what  is  ours.  Tell  me,  have  I 
ever,  ever  disrespected  you  ?  You  were  sacred  to  me  ;  and 
you  are,  though  now  the  change  has  come.  Look  back  on  it 
—  it  is  time  lost,  years  that  are  dust.  But  look  forward, 
and  you  cannot  imagine  our  separation.  What  I  propose  is 
plain  sense  for  us  two.  Since  Rovio,  I  have  been  at  your 
feet.  Have  I  not  some  just  claim  for  recompense  ?  Tell 
me!  Tony!" 

The  sweetness  of  the  secret  name,  the  privileged  name, 
in  his  mouth  stole  through  her  blood,  melting  resistance. 

She  had  consented.  The  swarthy  flaming  of  her  face 
avowed  it  even  more  than  the  surrender  of  her  hand.  He 
gained  much  by  claiming  little :  he  respected  her,  gave  her 
no  touches  of  fright  and  shame  ;  and  it  was  her  glory  to 
fall  with  pride.  An  attempt  at  a  caress  would  have 
awakened  her  view  of  the  whitherward :  but  she  was 
treated  as  a  sovereign  lady  rationally  advised. 

"  Is  it  since  Rovio,  Percy  ?  " 

"  Since  the  morning  when  you  refused  me  one  little 
flower." 

"  If  I  had  given  it,  you  might  have  been  saved ! " 

^'  I  fancy  I  was  doomed  from  the  beginning." 

"  I  was  worth  a  thought  ?  " 

^'  Worth  a  life  !  worth  ten  thousand  !  " 

"You  have  reckoned  it  all  like  a  sane  man: — family, 
position,  the  world,  the  scandal  ?  " 

"  All.  I  have  long  known  that  you  were  the  mate  for 
me.  You  have  to  weather  a  gale,  Tony.  It  won't  last. 
My  dearest !  it  won't  last  many  months.  I  regret  the  trial 
for  you,  but  I  shall  be  with  you,  burning  for  the  day  to 
reinstate  you  and  show  you  the  queen  you  are." 


236  DIAKA   OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

"  Yes,  we  two  can  have  no  covert  dealings,  Percy,"  said 
Diana.  They  would  be  hateful  —  baseness  !  Rejecting 
any  baseness,  it  seemed  to  her  that  she  stood  in  some 
brightness.  The  light  was  of  a  lurid  sort.  She  called  on 
her  heart  to  glory  in  it  as  the  light  of  tried  love,  the  love 
that  defied  the  world.  Her  heart  rose.  She  and  he  would 
at  a  single  step  give  proof  of  their  love  for  one  another : 
and  this  kingdom  of  love  —  how  different  from  her  recent 
craven  languors  !  —  this  kingdom  awaited  her,  was  hers  for 
one  word ;  and  beset  with  the  oceans  of  enemies,  it  was 
unassailable.  If  only  they  were  true  to  the  love  they 
vowed,  no  human  force  could  subvert  it :  and  she  doubted 
him  as  little  as  of  herself.  This  new  kingdom  of  love, 
never  entered  by  her,  acclaiming  her,  was  well-nigh  un- 
imaginable, in  spite  of  the  many  hooded  messengers  it  had 
despatched  to  her  of  late.  She  could  hardly  believe  that  it 
had  come. 

"  But  see  me  as  I  am,'^  she  said ;  she  faltered  it  through 
her  direct  gaze  on  him. 

"With  chains  to  strike  off ?  Certainly;  it  is  done,"  he 
replied. 

''  Rather  heavier  than  those  of  the  slave-market !  I  am 
the  deadest  of  burdens.  It  means  that  your  enemies,  per- 
sonal—  if  you  have  any,  and  political  —  you  have  numbers, 
will  raise  a  cry.  .  .  .  Realize  it.  You  may  still  be  my 
friend.     I  forgive  the  bit  of  wildness." 

She  provoked  a  renewed  kissing  of  her  hand ;  for  mag- 
nanimity in  love  is  an  overflowing  danger ;  and  when  he 
said  :  "  The  burden  you  have  to  bear  outweighs  mine  out  of 
all  comparison.  What  is  it  to  a  man  —  a  public  man  or 
not!  The  woman  is  always  the  victim.  That's  why  I 
have  held  myself  in  so  long  :  "  — her  strung  frame  softened. 
She  half  yielded  to  the  tug  on  her  arm. 

"  Is  there  no  talking  for  us  without  foolishness  ?  "  she 
murmured.  The  foolishness  had  wafted  her  to  sea,  far 
from  sight  of  land.  "  Xow  sit,  and  speak  soberly.  Discuss 
the  matter.  —  Yes,  my  hand,  but  I  must  have  my  wits. 
Leave  me  free  to  use  them  till  we  choose  our  path.  Let  it 
be  the  brains  between  us,  as  far  as  it  can.  You  ask  me  to 
join  my  fate  to  yours.  It  signifies  a  sharp  battle  for  you, 
dear  friend ;  perhaps  the  blighting  of  the  most  promising 


A  CHANGE  OF  TURNINGS  237 

life  in  England.  One  question  is,  can  I  countervail  the 
burden  I  shall  be,  by  such  help  to  you  as  I  can  afford  ? 
Burden,  is  no  word  —  I  rake  up  a  buried  fever.  I  have 
partially  lived  it  down,  and  instantly  I  am  covered  with 
spots.  The  old  false  charges  and  this  plain  offence  make  a 
monster  of  me." 

"  And  meanwhile  you  are  at  the  disposal  of  the  man  who 
falsely  charged  you  and  armed  the  world  against  you,"  said 
Dacier. 

"  I  can  fly.     The  world  is  wide." 

*^  Time  slips.  Your  youth  is  wasted.  If  you  escape  the 
man,  he  will  have  triumphed  in  keeping  you  from  me.  And 
I  thirst  for  you  ;  I  look  to  you  for  aid  and  counsel ;  I  want 
my  mate.  You  have  not  to  be  told  how  you  inspire  me  ? 
I  am  really  less  than  half  myself  without  you.  If  I  am  to 
do  anything  in  the  world,  it  must  be  with  your  aid,  you 
beside  me.  Our  hands  are  joined  :  one  leap  !  Do  you  not 
see  that  after  .  .  .  well,  it  cannot  be  friendship.  It  im- 
poses rather  more  on  me  than  I  can  bear.  You  are  not  the 
woman  to  trifle  ;  nor  I,  Tony,  the  man  for  it  with  a  woman 
like  you.  You  are  my  spring  of  wisdom.  You  interdict 
me  altogether  —  can  you  ?  —  or  we  unite  our  fates,  like 
these  hands  now.     Try  to  get  yours  away! " 

Her  effort  ended  in  a  pressure.  Kesistance,  nay,  to  hesi- 
tate at  the  joining  of  her  life  with  his  after  her  submission 
to  what  was  a  scorching  fire  in  memory,  though  it  was  less 
than  an  embrace,  accused  her  of  worse  than  foolishness. 

"  Well,  then,"  said  she,  "  wait  three  days.  Deliberate, 
Oh !  try  to  know  yourself,  for  your  clear  reason  to  guide 
you.  Let  us  be  something  better  than  the  crowd  abusing 
us,  not  simple  creatures  of  impulse  —  as  we  choose  to  call 
the  animal.  What  if  we  had  to  confess  that  we  took  to 
our  heels  the  moment  the  idea  struck  us !  Three  days. 
We  may  then  pretend  to  a  philosophical  resolve.  Then 
come  to  me :  or  write  to  me." 

"  How  long  is  it  since  the  old  Rovio  morning,  Tony  ?  " 

"  An  age." 

"  Date  my  deliberations  from  that  day." 

The  thought  of  hers  having  to  be  dated  possibly  from  an 
earlier  day,  robbed  her  of  her  summit  of  feminine  isolation, 
and  she  trembled,  chilled  and  flushed ;  she  lost  all  anchorage. 


238  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

<'  So  it  must  be  to-morrow,"  said  he,  reading  her  closely, 
"not  later.  Better  at  once.  But  women  are  not  to  be 
hurried." 

"Oh!  don't  class  me,  Percy,  pray!     I  think  of  you,  not 

of  myself." 

"  You  suppose  that  in  a  day  or  two  I  might  vary  ?  " 

She  fixed  her  eyes  on  him,  expressing  certainty  of  his 
unalterable  steadfastness.  The  look  allured.  It  changed  : 
her  head  shook.  She  held  away  and  said  :  "  No,  leave  me ; 
leave  me,  dear,  dear  friend.  Percy,  my  dearest!  I  will  not 
'play  the  sex.'  I  am  yours  if  .  .  .  if  it  is  your  wish.  It 
may  as  well  be  to-morrow.  Here  I  am  useless  ;  I  cannot 
write,  not  screw  a  thought  from  my  head.  I  dread  that 
'process  of  the  Law'  a  second  time.  To-morrow,  if  it 
must  be.  But  no  impulses.  Fortune  is  blind  ;  she  may  be 
kind  to  us.  The  blindness  of  Fortune  is  her  one  merit, 
and  fools  accuse  her  of  it,  and  they  profit  by  it !  I  fear  we 
all  of  us  have  our  turn  of  folly :  we  throw  the  stake  for 
good  luck.  I  hope  my  sin  is  not  very  great.  I  know  my 
position  is  desperate.  I  feel  a  culprit.  But  I  am  sure  I 
have  courage,  perhaps  brains  to  help.  At  any  rate,  I  may 
say  this :  I  bring  no  burden  to  my  lover  that  he  does  not 
know  of." 

Dacier  pressed  her  hand.  "  Money  we  shall  have  enough. 
My  uncle  has  left  me  fairly  supplied." 

"  What  would  he  think  ?  "  said  Diana,  half  in  a  glimpse 
of  meditation. 

"  Think  me  the  luckiest  of  the  breeched.  I  fancy  I  hear 
him  thanking  you  for  '  making  a  man '  of  me." 

She  blushed.  Some  such  phrase  might  have  been  spoken 
by  Lord  Dannisburgh. 

"  I  have  but  a  poor  sum  of  money,"  she  said.  "  I  may 
be  able  to  write  abroad.  Here  I  cannot  —  if  I  am  to  be 
persecuted." 

"  You  shall  write,  with  a  new  pen  !  "  said  Dacier.  ''You 
shall  live,  my  darling  Tony.  You  have  been  held  too  long 
in  this  miserable  suspension,  neither  maid  nor  wife,  neither 
woman  nor  stockfish.  Ah !  shameful.  But  we  '11  right  it. 
The  step,  for  us,  is  the  most  reasonable  that  could  be  con- 
sidered. You  shake  your  head.  But  the  circumstances 
make  it  so.     Courage,  and  we  come  to  happiness  !     And 


A  CHANGE   OF   TURNINGS  239 

that,  for  you  and  me,  meaDS  work.  Look  at  the  case  of 
Lord  and  Lady  Dulac.  It 's  identical,  except  that  she  is  no 
match  beside  you :  and  I  do  not  compare  her  antecedents 
with  yours.  But  she  braved  the  leap,  and  forced  the  world 
to  swallow  it,  and  now,  you  see,  she 's  perfectly  honoured. 
1  know  a  place  on  a  peak  of  the  Maritime  Alps,  exquisite 
in  summer,  cool,  perfectly  solitary,  no  English,  snow  round 
us,  pastures  at  our  feet,  and  the  Mediterranean  below. 
There  !  my  Tony.  To-morrow  night  we  start.  You  will 
meet  me  —  shall  I  call  here?  —  well,  then  at  the  railway 
station,  the  South-Eastern,  for  Paris :  say,  twenty  minutes 
to  eight.     I  have  your  pledge  ?     You  will  come  ?  " 

She  sighed  it,  then  said  it  firmly,  to  be  worthy  of  him. 
Kind  Fortune,  peeping  under  the  edge  of  her  bandaged 
eyes,  appeared  willing  to  bestow  the  beginning  of  happiness 
upon  one  who  thought  she  had  a  claim  to  a  small  taste  of  it 
before  she  died.  It  seemed  distinguishingly  done,  to  give 
a  bite  of  happiness  to  the  starving  ! 

"  I  fancied  when  you  were  announced  that  you  came  for 
congratulations  upon  your  approaching  marriage,  Percy." 

"  I  shall  expect  to  hear  them  from  you  to-morrow  even- 
ing at  the  station,  dear  Tony,"  said  he. 

The  time  was  again  stated,  the  pledge  repeated.  He 
forbore  entreaties  for  privileges,  and  won  her  gratitude. 

They  named  once  more  the  place  of  meeting  and  the 
hour :  more  significant  to  them  than  phrases  of  intensest 
love  and  passion.  Pressing  hands  sharply  for  pledge  of 
good  faith,  they  sundered. 

She  still  had  him  in  her  eyes  when  he  had  gone.  Her 
old  world  lay  shattered ;  her  new  world  was  up  without  a 
dawn,  with  but  one  figure,  the  sun  of  it,  to  light  the  swing- 
ing strangeness. 

Was  ever  man  more  marvellously  transformed  ?  or  woman 
more  wildly  swept  from  earth  into  the  clouds  ?  So  she 
mused  in  the  hum  of  her  tempest  of  heart  and  brain,  for- 
getful of  the  years  and  the  conditions  preparing  both  of 
them  for  this  explosion. 

She  had  much  to  do  :  the  arrangements  to  dismiss  her 
servants,  write  to  house-agents  and  her  lawyer,  and  write 
fully  to  Emma,  write  the  enigmatic  farewell  to  the  Es- 
quarts  and  Lady  Pennon,  Mary  Paynham,  Arthur  Ivhodes, 


240  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Whitmonby  (stanch,  in  friendship,  but  requiring  friendly 
touches),  Henry  Wilmers,  and  Eedworth.  He  was  reserved 
to  the  last,  for  very  enigmatical  adieux  :  he  would  hear  the 
whole  story  from  Emma ;  must  be  left  to  think  as  he  liked. 

The  vague  letters  were  excellently  well  composed  :  she 
was  going  abroad,  and  knew  not  when  she  would  return  ; 
bade  her  friends  think  the  best  they  could  of  her  in  the 
meantime.  Whitmonby  was  favoured  with  an  anecdote,  to 
be  read  as  an  apologue  by  the  light  of  subsequent  events. 
But  the  letter  to  Emma  tasked  Diana.  Intending  to  write 
fully,  her  pen  committed  the  briefest  sentences :  the  tender- 
ness she  felt  for  Emma  wakening  her  heart  to  sing  that  she 
was  loved,  loved,  and  knew  love  at  last ;  and  Emma's  fore- 
seen antagonism  to  the  love  and  the  step  it  involved  ren- 
dered her  pleadings  in  exculpation  a  stammered  confession 
of  guiltiness,  ignominious,  unworthy  of  the  pride  she  felt 
in  her  lover.  "  I  am  like  a  cartridge  rammed  into  a  gun,  to 
be  discharged  at  a  certain  hour  to-morrow,''  she  wrote  ;  and 
she  sealed  a  letter  so  frigid  that  she  could  not  decide  to 
post  it.  All  day  she  imagined  hearing  a  distant  cannonade. 
The  light  of  the  day  following  was  not  like  earthly  light. 
Danvers  assured  her  there  was  no  fog  in  London. 

"  London  is  insupportable  ;  I  am  going  to  Paris,  and  shall 
send  for  you  in  a  week  or  two,"  said  Diana. 

"  Allow  me  to  say,  ma'am,  that  you  had  better  take  me 
with  you,"  said  Danvers. 

''Are  you  afraid  of  travelling  by  yourself,  you  foolish 
creature  ?  " 

"  No,  ma'am,  but  I  don't  like  any  hands  to  undress  and 
dress  my  mistress  but  my  own." 

"  I  have  not  lost  the  art,"  said  Diana,  chafing  for  a  magic 
spell  to  extinguish  the  woman,  to  whom,  immediately  pity- 
ing her,  she  said  :  "  You  are  a  good  faithful  soul.  I  think 
you  have  never  kissed  me.     Kiss  me  on  the  forehead." 

Danvers  put  her  lips  to  her  mistress's  forehead,  and  was 
asked :  "  You  still  consider  yourself  attached  to  my  for- 
tunes ?  " 

"  I  do,  ma'am,  at  home  or  abroad ;  and  if  you  will  take 
me  with  you  .  .  ." 

"  Xot  for  a  week  or  so." 

*'  I  shall  not  be  in  the  way,  ma'am." 


A  DISAPPOINTED  LOVER  241 

They  played  at  shutting  eyes.  The  petition  of  Danvers 
was  declined ;  which  taught  her  the  more ;  and  she  was 
emboldened  to  say:  *' Wherever  my  mistress  goes,  she 
ought  to  have  her  attendant  with  her."  There  was  no 
answer  to  it  but  the  refusal. 

The  hours  crumbled  slowly,  each  with  a  blow  at  the 
passages  of  retreat.  Diana  thought  of  herself  as  another 
person,  whom  she  observed,  not  counselling  her,  because  it 
was  a  creature  visibly  pushed  by  the  Fates.  In  her  own 
mind  she  could  not  perceive  a  stone  of  solidity  anywhere, 
nor  a  face  that  had  the  appearance  of  our  common  life. 
She  heard  the  cannon  at  intervals.  The  things  she  said  set 
Danvers  laughing,  and  she  wondered  at  the  woman's  mingled 
mirth  and  stiffness.  Five  o'clock  struck.  Her  letters  were 
sent  to  the  post.  Her  boxes  were  piled  from  stairs  to  door. 
She  read  the  labels,  for  her  good-bye  to  the  hated  name  of 
Warwick:  —  Why  ever  adopted!  Emma  might  well  have 
questioned  why !  Women  are  guilty  of  such  unreasoning 
acts !  But  this  was  the  close  to  that  chapter.  The  hour  of 
six  went  by.  Between  six  and  seven  came  a  sound  of 
knocker  and  bell  at  the  street-door.  Danvers  rushed  into 
the  sitting-room  to  announce  that  it  was  Mr.  E,ed worth. 
Before  a  word  could  be  mustered,  Kedworth  was  in  the 
room.    He  said  :  "  You  must  come  with,  me  at  once  I " 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

IN  "WHICH  A  DISAPPOINTED   LOVER   RECEIVES    A   MULTITUDE 

OF    LESSONS 

Dacier  waited  at  the  station,  a  good  figure  of  a  sentinel 
over  his  luggage  and  a  spy  for  one  among  the  inpouring 
passengers.  Tickets  had  been  confidently  taken,  the  private 
division  of  the  carriages  happily  secured.  On  board  the 
boat  she  would  be  veiled.  Landed  on  French  soil,  they 
threw  off  disguises,  breasted  the  facts.  And  those  ?  They 
lightened.     He  smarted  with  his  eagerness. 

lo 


242  DIANA   OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

He  had  come  well  in  advance  of  the  appointed  time,  for 
he  would  not  have  had  her  hang  about  there  one  minute 
alone. 

Strange  as  this  adventure  was  to  a  man  of  prominent 
station  before  the  world,  and  electrical  as  the  turning-point 
of  a  destiny  that  he  was  given  to  weigh  deliberately  and 
far-sightedly,  Diana's  image  strung  him  to  the  pitch  of  it. 
He  looked  nowhere  but  ahead,  like  an  archer  putting  hand 
for  his  arrow. 

Presently  he  compared  his  watch  and  the  terminus  clock. 
She  should  now  be  arriving.  He  went  out  to  meet  her  and 
do  service.  Many  cabs  and  carriages  were  peered  into, 
couples  inspected,  ladies  and  their  maids,  wives  and  their 
husbands  —  an  August  exodus  to  the  Continent.  Nowhere 
the  starry  she.  But  he  had  a  fund  of  patience.  She  was 
now  in  some  block  of  the  streets.  He  was  sure  of  her,  sure 
of  her  courage.  Tony  and  recreancy  could  not  go  together. 
Now  that  he  called  her  Tony,  she  was  his  close  comrade, 
known;  the  name  was  a  caress  and  a  promise,  breathing  of 
her,  as  the  rose  of  sweetest  earth.  He  counted  it  to  be  a 
month  ere  his  family  would  have  wind  of  the  altered  posi- 
tion of  his  affairs,  possibly  a  year  to  the  day  of  his  making 
the  dear  woman  his  own  in  the  eyes  of  the  world.  She  was 
dear  past  computation,  womanly,  yet  quite  unlike  the 
womanish  women,  unlike  the  semi-males,  courteously  called 
dashing,  unlike  the  sentimental.  His  present  passion  for 
her  lineaments  declared  her  surpassingly  beautiful,  though 
his  critical  taste  was  rather  for  the  white  statue  that  gave 
no  warmth.  She  had  brains  and  ardour,  she  had  grace 
and  sweetness,  a  playful  petulancy  enlivening  our  atmos- 
phere, and  withal  a  refinement,  a  distinction,  not  to  be 
classed ;  and  justly  might  she  dislike  the  being  classed. 
Her  humour  was  a  perennial  refreshment,  a  running  well, 
that  caught  all  the  colours  of  light ;  her  wit  studded  the 
heavens  of  the  recollection  of  her.  In  his  heart  he  felt  that 
it  was  a  stepping  down  for  the  brilliant  woman  to  give  him 
her  hand;  a  condescension  and  an  act  of  valour.  She  who 
always  led  or  prompted  when  they  conversed,  had  now  in 
her  generosity  abandoned  the  lead  and  herself  to  him,  and 
she  deserved  his  utmost  honouring. 

But  where  was   she  ?     He  looked  at  his  watch,  looked 


A  DISAPPOINTED   LOVER 


243 


at  tlie  clock.     They  said  the  same:    ten  minutes  to   the 
moment  of  the  train's  departure. 

A  man  may  still  afford  to  dwell  on  the  charms  and  merits 
of  his  heart's  mistress  while  he  has  ten  minutes  to  spare. 
The  dropping  minutes,  however,  detract  one  by  one  from 
her   individuality   and  threaten   to   sink  her   in   her   sex 
entirely.    It  is  the  inexorable  clock  that  says  she  is  as  other 
women.     Dacier  began  to  chafe.     He  was  unaccustomed  to 
the  part  he  was  performing :  —  and  if  she  failed  him  ?    She 
would  not.     She  would  be  late,  though.     No,  she  was  in 
time  !     His  long  legs  crossed  the  platform  to  overtake  a  tall 
lady  Veiled  and  dressed  in  black.     He  lifted  his  hat ;  he 
heard  an  alarmed  little  cry  and  retired.     The  clock  said, 
Five  minutes  :  a  secret  chiromancy  in  addition  indicating 
on  its  face  the  word  Fool.     An  odd  word  to  be  cast  at  him  ! 
It  rocked  the  icy  pillar  of  pride  in  the  background  of  his 
nature.     Certainly  standiug  solus  at  the  hour  of  eight  p.m., 
he  would  stand  for  a  fool.     Hitherto  he  had  never  allowed 
a  woman  the  chance  to  posture  him  in  that  character.     He 
strode  out,  returned,  scanned  every  lady's  shape,  and  for  a 
distraction  watched  the  veiled  lady  whom  he  had  accosted. 
Her  figure  suggested  pleasant  features.     Either  she  was 
disappointed,  or  she  was  an  adept.     At  the  shutting  of  the 
gates  she  glided  through,  not  without  a  fearful  look  around 
and   at    him.     She    disappeared.     Dacier    shrugged.     His 
novel  assimilation  to  the  rat-rabble  of  amatory  intriguers 
tapped  him  on  the  shoulder  unpleasantly.     A  luckless  mem- 
ber of  the  fraternity  too  !     The  bell,  the  clock  and  the  tram 
gave  him  his  title.     "  And  I  was  ready  to  fling  down  every- 
thing for  the  woman!"     The  trial  of  a  superb   London 
gentleman's  resources  in  the  love-passion  could  not  have 
been  much  keener.     No  sign  of  her.  .,«,,. 

He  who  stands  ready  to  defy  the  world,  and  is  baffled  by 
the  absence  of  his  fair  assistant,  is  the  fool  doubled,  so 
completely  the  fool  that  he  heads  the  universal  shout :  he 
does  not  spare  himself.  The  sole  consolation  he  has  is  to 
revile  the  sex.  Women !  women  !  Whom  have  they  not 
made  a  fool  of !  His  uncle  as  much  as  any  —  and  professing 
to  know  them.  Him  also  !  the  man  proud  of  escaping  their 
wiles.  "For  this  woman!"  .  .  .  he  went  on  saying  after 
he  had  lost  sight  of  her  in  her  sex's  trickeries.    The  nearest 


244  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

he  could  get  to  her  was  to  conceive  that  the  arrant  coquette 
was  now  laughing  at  her  utter  subjugation  and  befooling  of 
the  man  popularly  supposed  invincible.  If  it  were  known 
of  him !  The  idea  of  his  being  a  puppet  fixed  for  derision 
was  madly  distempering.  He  had  only  to  ask  the  affirma- 
tive of  Constance  Asper  to-morrow  !  A  vision  of  his  deter- 
mining to  do  it,  somewhat  comforted  him. 

Dacier  walked  up  and  down  the  platform,  passing  his 
pile  of  luggage,  solitary  and  eloquent  on  the  barrow. 
Never  in  his  life  having  been  made  to  look  a  fool,  he 
felt  the  red  heat  of  the  thing,  as  a  man  who  has  not 
blessedly  become  acquainted  with  the  swish  m  boyhood  finds 
his  untempered  blood  turn  to  poison  at  a  blow ;  he  cannot 
healthily  take  a  licking.  But  then  it  had  been  so  splendid 
an  insanity  when  he  urged  Diana  to  fly  with  him.  Any- 
one but  a  woman  would  have  appreciated  the  sacrifice. 

His  luggage  had  to  be  removed.  He  dropped  his  porter 
a  lordly  fee  and  drove  home.  From  that  astonished  soli- 
tude he  strolled  to  his  Club.  Curiosity  mastering  the 
wrath  it  was  mixed  with,  he  left  his  Club  and  crossed  the 
park  southward  in  the  direction  of  Diana's  house,  abusing 
her  for  her  inveterate  attachment  to  the  regions  of  West- 
minster. There  she  used  to  receive  Lord  Dannisburgh; 
innocently,  no  doubt  —  assuredly  quite  innocently ;  and 
her  husband  had  quitted  the  district.  Still  it  was  rather 
childish  for  a  woman  to  be  always  haunting  the  seats  of 
Parliament.  Her  disposition  to  imagine  that  she  was 
able  to  inspire  statesmen  came  in  for  a  share  of  ridicule ; 
for  when  we  know  ourselves  to  be  ridiculous,  a  retort  in 
kind,  unjust  upon  consideration,  is  balm.  The  woman 
dragged  him  down  to  the  level  of  common  men ;  that 
was  the  peculiar  injury,  and  it  swept  her  undistinguished 
into  the  stream  of  women.  In  appearance,  as  he  had 
proved  to  the  fellows  at  •  his  Club,  he  was  perfectly  self- 
possessed,  mentally  distracted  and  bitter,  hating  himself 
for  it,  snapping  at  the  cause  of  it.  She  had  not  merely 
disappointed,  she  had  slashed  his  high  conceit  of  himself, 
curbed  him  at  the  first  animal  dash  forward,  and  he 
champed  the  bit  with  the  fury  of  a  thwarted  racer. 

Twice  he  passed  her  house.  Of  course  no  light  was 
shown  at  her  windows.     They  were  scanned  malignly. 


A  DISAPPOINTED  LOVER  215 

He  held  it  due  to  her  to  call  and  inquire  whether  there 
was  any  truth  in  the  report  of  Mrs.  Warwick's  illness. 
Mrs.  Warwick !     She  meant  to  keep  the  name. 

A  maid-servant  came  to  the  door  with  a  candle  in  her 
hand  revealing  red  eyelids.  She  was  not  aware  that  her 
mistress  was  unwell.  Her  mistress  had  left  home  some 
time  after  six  o'clock  with  a  gentleman.  She  was  unable 
to  tell  him  the  gentleman's  name.  William,  the  footman, 
had  opened  the  door  to  him.  Her  mistress's  maid  Mrs. 
Danvers  had  gone  to  the  Play  —  with  William.  She 
thought  that  Mrs.  Danvers  might  know  who  the  gentle- 
man was.  The  girl's  eyelids  blinked,  and  she  turned 
aside.  Dacier  consoled  her  with  a  piece  of  gold,  saying 
he  would  come  and  see  Mrs.  Danvers  in  the  morning. 

His  wrath  was  partially  quieted  by  the  new  speculations 
offered  up  to  it.  He  could  not  conjure  a  suspicion  of 
treachery  in  Diana  Warwick;  and  a  treachery  so  foully 
cynical !  She  had  gone  with  a  gentleman.  He  guessed  on 
all  sides ;  he  struck  at  walls,  as  in  complete  obscurity. 

The  mystery  of  her  conduct  troubling  his  wits  for  the 
many  hours  was  explained  by  Danvers.  With  a  sympathy 
that  she  was  at  pains  to  show,  she  informed  him  that  her 
mistress  was  not  at  all  unwell,  and  related  of  how  Mr.  Eed- 
worth  had  arrived  just  when  her  mistress  was  on  the  point 
of  starting  for  Paris  and  the  Continent ;  because  poor  Lady 
Dunstane  was  this  very  day  to  undergo  an  operation  under 
the  surgeons  at  Copsley,  and  she  did  not  wish  her  mistress 
to  be  present,  but  Mr.  Eedworth  thought  her  mistress 
ought  to  be  there,  and  he  had  gone  down  thinking  she  was 
there,  and  then  came  back  in  hot  haste  to  fetch  her,  and 
was  just  in  time,  as  it  happened,  by  two  or  three  minutes. 

Dacier  rewarded  the  sympathetic  woman  for  her  intelli- 
gence, which  appeared  to  him  to  have  shot  so  far  as  to 
require  a  bribe.  Gratitude  to  the  person  soothing  his 
unwontedly  ruffled  temper  was  the  cause  of  the  indiscre- 
tion in  the  amount  he  gave. 

It  appeared  to  him  that  he  ought  to  proceed  to  Copsley 
for  tidings  of  Lady  Dunstane.  Thither  he  sped  by  the 
handy  railway  and  a  timely  train.  He  reached  the  park- 
gates  at  three  in  the  afternoon,  telling  his  flyman  to  wait. 
As  he   advanced  by  short  cuts  over  the  grass,  he  studied 


246  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

the  look  of  the  rows  of  windows.  She  was  within,  and 
strangely  to  his  clouded  senses  she  was  no  longer  Tony, 
no  longer  the  deceptive  woman  he  could  in  justice  abuse. 
He  and  she,  so  close  to  union,  were  divided.  A  hand 
resembling  the  palpable  interposition  of  Fate  had  swept 
them  asunder.  Having  the  poorest  right — not  any  —  to 
reproach  her,  he  was  disarmed,  he  felt  himself  a  miserable 
intruder;  he  summoned  his  passion  to  excuse  him,  and 
gained  some  unsatisfied  repose  of  mind  by  contemplating 
its  devoted  sincerity ;  which  roused  an  effort  to  feel  for 
the  sufferer  —  Diana  Warwick's  friend.  With  the  pair  of 
surgeons  named,  the  most  eminent  of  their  day,  in  attend- 
ance, the  case  must  be  serious.  To  vindicate  the  breaker 
of  her  pledge,  his  present  plight  likewise  assured  him  of 
that,  and  nearing  the  house  he  adopted  instinctively  the 
funeral  step  and  mood,  just  sensible  of  a  novel  small- 
ness.  For  the  fortifying  testimony  of  his  passion  had  to 
be  put  aside,  he  was  obliged  to  disavow  it  for  a  simpler 
motive  if  he  applied  at  the  door.  He  stressed  the  motive, 
produced  the  sentiment,  and  passed  thus  naturally  into 
hypocrisy,  as  lovers  precipitated  by  their  blood  among  the 
crises  of  human  conditions  are  often  forced  to  do.  He  had 
come  to  inquire  after  Lady  Dunstane.  He  remembered 
that  it  had  struck  him  as  a  duty,  on  hearing  of  her  danger- 
ous illness. 

The  door  opened  before  he  touched  the  bell.  Sir  Lukin 
knocked  against  him  and  stared. 

*'  Ah  !  —  who  ?  —  you  ?  "  he  said,  and  took  him  by  the 
arm  and  pressed  him  on  along  the  gravel.  "Dacier,  are 
you  ?  Kedworth  's  in  there.  Come  on  a  step,  come  !  It 's 
the  time  for  us  to  pray.  Good  God !  There 's  mercy  for 
sinners.  If  ever  there  was  a  man !  .  .  .  But,  oh,  good  God  ! 
she  's  in  their  hands  this  minute.  My  saint  is  under  the 
knife." 

Dacier  was  hurried  forward  by  a  powerful  hand. 
"  They  say  it  lasts  about  five  minutes,  four  and  a  half —  or 
more !  My  God  !  When  they  turned  me  out  of  her  room, 
she  smiled  to  keep  me  calm.  She  said,  '  Dear  husband ' : 
—  the  veriest  wretch  and  bmtallest  husband  ever  poor 
woman  .  .  .  and  a  saint !  a  saint  on  earth !  Emmy ! " 
Tears  burst  from  him. 


A  DISAPPOINTED  LOVER  247 

He  pulled  forth  his  watch  and  asked  Dacier  for  the  time. 

<*  A  minute  *s  gone  in  a  minute.  It 's  three  minutes  and 
a  half.  Come  faster.  They  're  at  their  work !  It 's  life  or 
death.  I  've  had  death  about  me.  But  for  a  woman  !  and 
your  wife  !  and  that  brave  soul !  She  bears  it  so.  Women 
are  the  bravest  creatures  afloat.  If  they  make  her  shriek, 
it'll  be  only  if  she  thinks  I  'm  out  of  hearing.  No  :  I  see 
her.  She  bears  it !  —  They  may  n't  have  begun  yet.  It 
may  all  be  over !  Come  into  the  wood.  I  must  pray.  I 
must  go  on  ray  knees." 

Two  or  three  steps  in  the  wood,  at  the  mossed  roots  of 
a  beech,  lie  fell  kneeling,  muttering,  exclaiming. 

The  tempest  of  penitence  closed  with  a  blind  look  at  his 
watch,  which  he  left  dangling.  He  had  to  talk  to  drug  his 
thoughts. 

"And  mind  you,"  said  he,  when  he  had  rejoined  Dacier 
and  was  pushing  his  arm  again,  rounding  beneath  the  trees 
to  a  view  of  the  house,  "  for  a  man  steeped  in  damnable 
iniquity !  She  bears  it  all  for  me,  because  I  begged  her, 
for  the  chance  of  her  living.  It 's  my  doing  —  this  knife ! 
Macpherson  swears  there  is  a  chance.  Thomson  backs 
him.  But  they  're  at  her,  cutting !  .  .  .  The  pain  must  be 
awful  —  the  mere  pain  !  The  gentlest  creature  ever  drew 
breath  !  And  women  fear  blood  —  and  her  own  !  —  And 
a  head !  She  ought  to  have  married  the  best  man  alive,  not 
a  — !  I  can't  remember  her  once  complaining  of  me  — 
not  once.  A  common  donkey  compared  to  her  !  All  I  can 
do  is  to  pray.  And  she  knows  the  beast  I  am,  and  has  for- 
given me.  There  is  n't  a  blessed  text  of  Scripture  that 
does  n't  cry  out  in  praise  of  her.  And  they  cut  and 
hack!  ..."  He  dropped  his  head.  The  vehement  big 
man  heaved,  shuddering.     His  lips  worked  fast. 

"  She  is  not  alone  with  them,  unsupported  ?  "  said 
Dacier. 

Sir  Lukin  moaned  for  relief.  He  caught  his  watch 
swinging  and  stared  at  it.  "  What  a  good  fellow  you  were 
to  come  !  Now  's  the  time  to  know  your  friends.  There  's 
Diana  Warwick,  true  as  steel.  Redworth  came  on  her  tip- 
toe for  the  Continent;  he  had  only  to  mention  .  .  .  Emmy 
wanted  to  spare  her.  She  would  not  liave  sent  —  wanted  to 
spare  her  the  sight.     I  offered  to  stand  by  .  .  .  Chased  me 


248  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

out.  Diana  Warwick 's  there :  —  worth  fifty  of  me ! 
Dacier,  I  We  had  my  sword-blade  tried  by  Indian  horsemen, 
and  I  know  what  true  as  steel  means.  She 's  there.  And 
I  know  she  shrinks  from  the  sight  of  blood.  My  oath  on 
it,  she  won't  quiver  a  muscle !  Next  to  my  wdfe,  you  may 
take  my  word  for  it,  Dacier,  Diana  Warwick  is  the  pick  of 
living  women.  I  could  prove  it.  They  go  together.  I 
could  prove  it  over  and  over.  She  's  the  loyallest  woman 
anywhere.  Her  one  error  was  that  marriage  of  hers,  and 
how  she  ever  pitched  herself  into  it,  none  of  us  can  guess." 
After  a  while,  he  said :   '*  Look  at  your  watch." 

"Nearly  twenty  minutes  gone." 

''  Are  they  afraid  to  send  out  word  ?  It 's  that  window  !  " 
He  covered  his  eyes,  and  muttered,  sighed.  He  became 
abruptly  composed  in  appearance.  "  The  worst  of  a  black 
sheep  like  me  is,  I  'm  such  an  infernal  sinner,  that  Provi- 
dence !  .  .  .  But  both  surgeons  gave  me  their  word  of  hon- 
our that  there  was  a  chance.  A  chance  !  But  it 's  the  end 
of  me  if  Emmy —  Good  God!  no!  the  knife's  enough; 
don't  let  her  be  killed !  It  would  be  murder.  Here  am  I 
talking !  I  ought  to  be  praying.  I  should  have  sent  for 
the  parson  to  help  me;  I  can't  get  the  proper  words  —  bel- 
low like  a  rascal  trooper  strung  up  for  the  cat.  It  must  be 
twenty-five  minutes  now.     Who 's  alive  now  !  " 

Dacier  thought  of  the  Persian  Queen  crying  for  news  of 
the  slaughtered,  with  her  mind  on  her  lord  and  husband: 
"Who  is  not  dead?"  Diana  exalted  poets,  and  here  was 
an  example  of  the  truth  of  one  to  nature,  and  of  the  poor 
husband's  depth  of  feeling.  They  said  not  the  same  thing, 
but  it  was  the  same  cry  de  profundis. 

He  saw  Redworth  coming  at  a  quick  pace. 

Redworth  raised  his  hand.  Sir  Lukin  stopped.  **  He  's 
waving ! " 

"  It 's  good,"  said  Dacier. 

"  Speak  !  are  you  sure  ?  " 

"I  judge  by  the  look." 

Redworth  stepped  unfalteringly. 

"  It 's  over,  all  well,"  he  said.  He  brushed  his  forehead 
and  looked  sharply  cheerful. 

"  My  dear  fellow  !  my  dear  fellow  ! "  Sir  Lukin  grasped 
his  hand.     "  It 's  more  than  I  deserve.     Over  ?    She  has 


A  DISAPPOINTED   LOVER  249 

borne  it!  She  would  have  gone  to  heaven  and  leit 
me  — !     Is  she  safe  ?  " 

"Doing  well." 

"  Have  you  seen  the  surgeons?  " 

"Mrs.  Warwick." 

"  What  did  she  say  ?  " 

"  A  nod  of  the  head." 

"  You  saw  her  ?  " 

**  She  came  to  the  stairs." 

"Diana  Warwick  never  lies.  She  would  n't  lie,  not  with 
a  nod  !     They  Ve  saved  Emmy  —  do  you  think  ?  " 

"It  looks  well." 

"  My  girl  has  passed  the  worst  of  it  ?  " 

"That's  over." 

Sir  Lukin  gazed  glassily.  The  necessity  of  his  agony 
was  to  lean  to  the  belief,  at  a  beckoning,  that  Providence 
pardoned  him,  in  tenderness  for  what  would  have  been  his 
loss.  He  realized  it,  and  experienced  a  sudden  calm  :  tes- 
tifying to  the  positive  pardon. 

"  Now,  look  here,  you  two  fellows,  listen  half  a  moment,'' 
he  addressed  Redworth  and  Dacier ;  ''  I  've  been  the  biggest 
scoundrel  of  a  husband  unhung,  and  married  to  a  saint; 
and  if  she  's  only  saved  to  me,  I  '11  swear  to  serve  her  faith- 
fully, or  may  a  thunderbolt  knock  me  to  perdition !  and 
thank  God  for  his  justice !  Prayers  are  answered,  minci 
you,  though  a  fellow  may  be  as  black  as  a  sweep.  Take  it 
warning  from  me.     I  've  had  my  lesson." 

Dacier  soon  after  talked  of  going.  The  hope  of  seeing 
Diana  had  abandoned  him,  the  desire  was  almost  extinct. 

Sir  Lukin  could  not  let  him  go.  He  yearned  to  preabh 
to  him  or  anyone  from  his  personal  text  of  the  sinner 
honourably  remorseful  on  account  of  and  notwithstanding 
the  forgiveness  of  Providence,  and  he  implored  Dacier  and 
Redworth  by  turns  to  be  careful  when  they  married  of  how 
they  behaved  to  the  sainted  women  their  wives ;  never  to 
lend  ear  to  the  devil  nor  to  believe,  as  he  had  done,  that 
there  is  no  such  thing  as  a  devil,  for  he  had  been  the  vic- 
tim of  him,  and  he  knew.  The  devil,  he  loudly  proclaimed, 
has  a  multiplicity  of  lures,  and  none  more  deadly  than 
when  he  baits  with  a  petticoat.  He  had  been  hooked,  and 
had  found  the  devil  in  person.     He  begged  them  urgently 


250  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

to  keep  his  example  in  memory.  By  following  this  and 
that  wildfire  he  had  stuck  himself  in  a  bog — a  common  re- 
sult with  those  who  would  not  see  the  devil  at  work  upon 
them ;  and  it  required  his  dear  suffering  saint  to  be  at 
death's  doors,  cut  to  pieces  and  gasping,  to  open  his  eyes. 
But,  thank  heaven,  they  were  opened  at  last !  Now  he  saw 
the  beast  he  was :  a  filthy  beast !  unworthy  of  tying  his 
wife's  shoestring.  No  confessions  could  expose  to  them 
the  beast  he  was.  But  let  them  not  fancy  there  was  no 
such  thing  as  an  active  Devil  about  the  world. 

E-edworth  divined  that  the  simply  sensational  man  abased 
himself  before  Providence  and  heaped  his  gratitude  on  the 
awful  Power  in  order  to  render  it  difficult  for  the  promise 
of  the  safety  of  his  wife  to  be  withdrawn. 

He  said :  "  There  is  good  hope  j "  and  drew  an  admoni- 
tion upon  himself. 

^'  Ah !  my  dear  good  Kedworth,"  Sir  Lukin  sighed  from 
his  elevation  of  out-spoken  penitence :  "  you  will  see  as  I 
do  some  day.  It  is  the  devil,  think  as  you  like  of  it. 
When  you  have  pulled  down  all  the  Institutions  of  the 
Country,  what  do  you  expect  but  ruins  ?  That  Badicalism 
of  yours  has  its  day.  You  have  to  go  through  a  wrestle 
like  mine  to  understand  it.  You  say,  the  day  is  fine,  let's 
have  our  game.  Old  England  pays  for  it  !  Then  you  '11 
find  how  you  love  the  old  land  of  your  birth  —  the  noblest 
ever  called  a  nation  !  —  with  your  Corn  Law  Eepeals  !  —  eh, 
Dacier  ?  —  You'll  own  it  was  the  devil  tempted  you.  I 
hear  you  apologizing.     Pray  God,  it  may  n't  be  too  late  !  " 

He  looked  up  at  the  windows.      "  She  may  be  sinking!  " 

•'Have  no  fears,"  Kedworth  said  ;  "Mrs.  Warwick  would 
send  for  you." 

"  She  would.  Diana  Warwick  would  be  sure  to  send, 
Next  to  my  wife,  Diana  Warwick  's  .  .  .  she  'd  send,  never 
fear.  I  dread  that  room.  I  'd  rather  go  through  a  regiment 
of  sabres  —  though  it 's  over  now.  And  Diana  Warwick 
stood  it.  The  worst  is  over,  you  told  me.  By  heaven  I 
women  are  wonderful  creatures.  But  she  has  n't  a  peer  for 
courage.  I  could  trust  her  —  most  extraordinary  thing,  that 
marriage  of  hers  !  —  not  a  soul  has  ever  been  able  to  explain 
it :  — trust  her  to  the  death." 

Eedworth  left  them,  and  Sir  Lukin  ejaculated  on  the 


A  DISAPPOINTED  LOVER  251 

merits  of  Diana  Warwick  to  Dacier.  He  laughed  scornfully : 
"  And  that 's  the  woman  the  world  attacks  for  want  of 
virtue !  Why,  a  fellow  has  n't  a  chance  with  her,  not  a 
chance.  She  comes  out  in  blazing  armour  if  you  unmask  a 
battery.  I  don't  know  how  it  might  be  if  she  were  in  love 
with  a  fellow.  I  doubt  her  thinking  men  worth  the  trouble. 
I  never  met  the  man.  But  if  she  were  to  take  fire,  Troy  'd 
be  nothing  to  it.  I  wonder  whether  we  might  go  in :  I 
dread  the  house." 

Dacier  spoke  of  departing. 

"No,  no,  wait,"  Sir  Lukin  begged  him.  "I  was  talking 
about  women.  They  are  the  devil  —  or  he  makes  most  use 
of  them :  and  you  must  learn  to  see  the  cloven  foot  under 
their  petticoats,  if  you're  to  escape  them.  There's  no  pro- 
tection in  being  in  love  with  your  wife ;  I  married  for  love ; 
I  am,  I  always  have  been,  in  love  with  her  ;  and  I  went  to 
the  deuce.  The  music  struck  up  and  away  I  waltzed.  A 
woman  like  Diana  Warwick  might  keep  a  fellow  straight, 
because  she 's  all  round  you  ;  she 's  man  and  woman  in 
brains ;  and  legged  like  a  deer,  and  breasted  like  a  swan, 
and  a  regular  sheaf  of  arrows  in  her  eyes.  Dark  women  — 
ah  !  But  she  has  a  contempt  for  us,  you  know.  That 's  the 
secret  of  her.  —  lledworth  's  at  the  door.  Bad  ?  Is  it  bad  ? 
I  never  was  particularly  fond  of  that  house  —  hated  it.  I 
love  it  now  for  Emmy's  sake.  I  could  n't  live  in  another  — 
though  I  should  be  haunted.  Eather  her  ghost  than  nothing 
—  though  I  'm  an  infernal  coward  about  the  next  world. 
But  if  you  're  right  with  religion  you  need  n't  fear.  What 
I  can't  comprehend  in  Eedworth  is  his  Radicalism,  and 
getting  richer  and  richer." 

"  It 's  not  a  vow  of  poverty,"  said  Dacier. 

"He'll  find  they  don't  coalesce,  or  his  children  will. 
Once  the  masses  are  uppermost !  It 's  a  bad  day,  Dacier, 
when  we've  no  more  gentlemen  in  the  land.  Emmy  backs 
him,  so  I  hold  my  tongue.  To-morrow  's  a  Sunday.  I  wish 
you  were  staying  here  ;  I  'd  take  you  to  church  with  me  — ■ 
we  shirk  it  when  we  have  n't  a  care.  It  could  n't  do  you 
harm.  I've  heard  capital  sermons.  I've  always  had  the 
good  habit  of  going  to  church,  Dacier.  Now  's  the  time  for 
remembering  them.  Ah,  my  dear  fellow,  I'm  not  a  parson- 
It  would  have  been  better  for  me  if  I  had  been." 


252  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

And  for  you  too !  his  look  added  plainly.  He  longed  to 
preach;  he  was  impelled  to  chatter. 

Eedworth  reported  the  patient  perfectly  quiet,  breathing 
calmly. 

"  Laudanum  ?  "  asked  Sir  Lukin.  "  Now  there 's  a  poison 
we  We  got  to  bless !  And  we  set  up  in  our  wisdom  for  know- 
ing what  is  good  for  us  !  ^' 

He  had  talked  his  hearers  into  a  stupefied  assent  to  any- 
thing he  uttered. 

"Mrs.  Warwick  would  like  to  see  you  in  two  or  three 
minutes  ;  she  will  come  down,"  Red  worth  said  to  Dacier. 

"That  looks  well,  eh?  That  looks  bravely,"  Sir  Lukin 
cried.  "  Diana  Warwick  would  n't  leave  the  room  without 
a  certainty.  1  dread  the  look  of  those  men ;  I  shall  have 
to  shake  their  hands  !  And  so  I  do,  with  all  my  heart : 
only  —  But  God  bless  them  !  But  we  must  go  in,  if 
she 's  coming  down." 

They  entered  the  house,  and  sat  in  the  drawing-room, 
where  Sir  Lukin  took  up  from  the  table  one  of  his  wife's 
Latin  books,  a  Persius,  bearing  her  marginal  notes.  He 
dropped  his  head  on  it,  with  sobs. 

The  voice  of  Diana  recalled  him  to  the  present.  She 
counselled  him  to  control  himself ;  in  that  case  he  might  for 
one  moment  go  to  the  chamber-door  and  assure  himself  by 
the  silence  that  his  wife  was  resting.  She  brought  permis- 
sion from  the  surgeons  and  doctor,  on  his  promise  to  be 
Still. 

Redworth  supported  Sir  Lukin  tottering  out. 

Dacier  had  risen.  He  was  petrified  by  Diana's  face,  and 
thought  of  her  as  whirled  from  him  in  a  storm,  bearing  the 
marks  of  it.  Her  underlip  hung  for  short  breaths ;  the  big 
drops  of  her  recent  anguish  still  gathered  on  her  brows ; 
her  eyes  were  tearless,  lustreless  ;  she  looked  ancient  in 
youth,  and  distant  by  a  century,  like  a  tall  woman  of  the 
vaults,  issuing  white-ringed,  not  of  our  light. 

She  shut  her  mouth  for  strength  to  speak  to  him. 

He  said  :  "  You  are  not  ill  ?     You  are  strong  ?  " 

"  I  ?  Oh,  strong.  I  will  sit.  I  cannot  be  absent  longer 
than  two  minutes.  The  trial  of  her  strength  is  to  come. 
If  it  were  courage,  we  might  be  sure.     The  day  is  fine  ?  " 

^'  A  perfect  August  day." 


A  DISAPPOINTED   LOVER 


253 


"  I  held  her  through  it.  I  am  thankful  to  heaven  it  was 
no  other  hand  than  mine.  She  wished  to  spare  me.  She 
was  glad  of  her  Tony  when  the  time  came.  I  thought  I  was 
a  coward  — I  could  have  changed  with  her  to  save  her;  i 
am  a  strong  woman,  ht  to  submit  to  that  work.  I  should 
not  have  borne  it  as  she  did.  She  expected  to  sink  under 
it  All  her  dispositions  were  made  for  death  —  bequests  to 
servants  and  to  .  .  .  to  friends  :  every  secret  liking  they 
had,  thought  of  ! " 

Diana  clenched  her  hands. 
"  I  hope  !  "  Dacier  said. 

"You  shall  hear  regularly.  Call  at  Sir  William's  house 
to-morrow.  He  sleeps  here  to-night.  The  suspense  must 
last  for  days.  It  is  a  question  of  vital  power  to  bear  the 
shock.  She  has  a  mind  so  like  a  fiymg  spirit  that,  ]ust 
before  the  moment,  she  made  Mr.  Lanyan  Thomson  smile 
by  quoting  some  saying  of  her  Tony's." 

"  Trv  bv-and-by  to  recollect  it,"  said  Dacier. 
"  And  you  were  with  that  poor  man  !     How  did  he  pass 
the  terrible  time  ?     I  pitied  him." 

'' He  suffered ;  he  prayed."  ^    ,         i.  v^ 

"  It  was  the  best  he  could  do.  Mr.  Redworth  was  as  he 
always  is  at  the  trial,  a  pillar.  Happy  the  friend  who 
knows  him  for  one !  He  never  thinks  of  himself  m  a  crisis. 
He  is  sheer  strength  to  comfort  and  aid.  They  will  drive 
you  to  the  station  with  Mr.  Thomson.  He  returns  to  re- 
lieve Sir  William  to-morrow.  I  have  learnt  to  admire  the 
men  of  the  knife!  No  profession  equals  theirs  in  selt- 
command  and  beneficence.     Dr.  Bridgenorth  is  permanent 

here." 

"  i  have  a  fly,  and  go  back  immediately,"  said  Dacier. 

"She  shall  hear  of  your  coming.     Adieu." 

Diana  gave  him  her  hand.     It  was  gently  pressed. 

A  wonderment  at  the  utter  change  of  circumstances  took 
Dacier  passingly  at  the  sight  of  her  vanishing  figure. 

He   left   the  house,  feeling  he  dared  have  no  personal 
wishes.    It  had  ceased  to  be  the  lover's  hypocrisy  with  him. 

The  crisis   of   mortal  peril  in  that  house  enveloped  its 
inmates,  and  so  wrought  in  him  as  to  enshroud  the  stripped 
outcrying  husband,  of  whom  he  had  no  clear  recollection 
save  of  the  man's  agony.     The  two  women,  striving  against 


254  DIANA  OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

death,  devoted  in  friendship,  were  the  sole  living  images 
he  brought  away ;  they  were  a  new  vision  of  the  world  and 
our  life. 

He  hoped  with  Diana,  bled  with  her.  She  rose  above 
him  high,  beyond  his  transient  human  claims.  He  envied 
Eedworth  the  common  friendly  right  to  be  near  her.  In 
reflection,  long  after,  her  simplicity  of  speech,  washed  pure 
of  the  blood-emotions,  for  token  of  her  great  nature,  dur- 
ing those  two  minutes  of  their  sitting  together,  was  dearer, 
sweeter  to  the  lover  than  if  she  had  shown  by  touch  or 
word  that  a  faint  allusion  to  their  severance  was  in  her 
mind ;  and  this  despite  a  certain  vacancy  it  created. 

He  received  formal  information  of  Lady  Dunstane's 
progress  to  convalescence.  By  degrees  the  simply  official 
tone  of  Diana's  letters  combined  with  the  ceasing  of  them 
and  the  absence  of  her  personal  charm  to  make  a  gentle- 
man not  remarkable  for  violence  in  the  passion  so  calmly 
reasonable  as  to  think  the  dangerous  presence  best  avoided 
for  a  time.  Subject  to  fits  of  the  passion,  he  certainly  was, 
but  his  position  in  the  world  was  a  counselling  spouse, 
jealous  of  his  good  name.  He  did  not  regret  his  proposal 
to  take  the  leap;  he  would  not  have  regretted  it  if  taken. 
On  the  safe  side  of  the  abyss,  however,  it  wore  a  gruesome 
look  to  his  cool  blood. 


CHAPTER  XXYII 

CONTAINS    MATTER    FOR    SUBSEQUENT    EXPLOSION 

Among  the  various  letters  inundating  Sir  Lukin  Dun- 
stane  upon  the  report  of  the  triumph  of  surgical  skill 
achieved  by  Sir  William  Macpherson  and  Mr.  Lanyan 
Thomson,  was  one  from  Lady  Wathin,  dated  Adlands, 
an  estate  of  Mr.  Quintin  Manx's  in  Warwickshire,  peti- 
tioning for  the  shortest  line  of  reassurance  as  to  the  con- 
dition of  her  dear  cousin,  and  an  intimation  of  the  period 
when  it  might  be  deemed  possible  for  a  relative  to  call  and 
offer  her  sincere  congratulations  :  a  letter  deserving  a  per- 


MATTER  FOR   SUBSEQUENT   EXPLOSION  255 

sonal  reply,  one  would  suppose.  She  received  the  following, 
in  a  succinct  female  hand  corresponding  to  its  terseness; 
every  t  righteously  crossed,  every  i  punctiliously  dotted,  as 
she  remarked  to  Constance  Asper,  to  whom  the  communi- 
cation was  transferred  for  perusal :  — 

"Dear  Lady  Wathin,  —  Lady  Dunstane  is  gaining 
strength.  The  measure  of  her  pulse  indicates  favourably. 
She  shall  be  informed  in  good  time  of  your  solicitude  for 
her  recovery.  The  day  cannot  yet  be  named  for  visits  of 
any  kind.  You  will  receive  information  as  soon  as  the 
house  is  open. 

"  I  have  undertaken  the  task  of  correspondence,  and  beg 
you  to  believe  me, 

"  Very  truly  yours, 

''D.  A.  Warwick.'' 

Miss  Asper  speculated  on  the  hand-writing  of  her  rival. 
She  obtained  permission  to  keep  the  letter,  with  the  inten- 
tion of  transmitting  it  per  post  to  an  advertising  interpreter 
of  character  in  caligraphy. 

Such  was  the  character  of  the  fair  young  heiress,  ex- 
hibited by  her  performances  much  more  patently  than  the 
run  of  a  quill  would  reveal  it. 

She  said,  "It  is  rather  a  pretty  hand,  I  think." 

"  Mrs.  Warwick  is  a  practised  writer,"  said  Lady  Wathin. 
"Writing  is  her  profession,  if  she  has  any.  She  goes  to 
nurse  my  cousin.  Her  husband  says  she  is  an  excellent 
nurse.  He  says  what  he  can  for  her.  But  you  must  be 
in  the  last  extremity,  or  she  is  ice.  His  appeal  to  her  has 
been  totally  disregarded.  Until  he  drops  down  in  the 
street,  as  his  doctor  expects  him  to  do  some  day,  she  will 
continue  her  course;  and  even  then  ..." 

An  adventuress  desiring  her  freedom!  Lady  Wathin 
looked.  She  was  too  devout  a  woman  to  say  what  she 
thought.  But  she  knew  the  world  to  be  yery  wicked.  Of 
Mrs.  Warwick,  her  opinion  was  formed.  She  would  not 
have  charged  the  individual  creature  with  a  criminal 
design;  all  she  did  was  to  stuff  the  person  her  virtue 
abhorred  with  the  wickedness  of  the  world,  and  that  is  a 
common  process  in  antipathy. 


256  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

She  sympathized,  moreover,  with  the  beautiful  devoted- 
ness  of  the  wealthy  heiress  to  her  ideal  of  man.  It  had 
led  her  to  make  the  acquaintance  of  old  Lady  Dacier,  at 
the  house  in  town,  where  Constance  Asper  had  first  met 
Percy;  Mrs.  Grafton  Winstanley's  house,  representing 
neutral  territory  or  debateable  land  for  the  occasional 
intercourse  of  the  upper  class  and  the  climbing  in  the 
professions  or  in  commerce;  Mrs.  Grafton  Winstanley  be- 
ing on  the  edge  of  aristocracy  by  birth,  her  husband,  like 
Mr.  Quintin  Manx,  a  lord  of  fleets.  Old  Lady  Dacier's 
bluntness  in  speaking  of  her  grandson  would  have  shocked 
Lady  Wathin  as  much  as  it  astonished,  had  she  been  less 
of  an  ardent  absorber  of  aristocratic  manners.  Percy  was 
plainly  called  a  donkey,  for  hanging  oft'  and  on  with  a 
handsome  girl  of  such  expectations  as  Miss  Asper.  "  But 
what  you  can't  do  with  a  horse,  you  can't  hope  to  do  with 
a  donkey."  She  added  that  she  had  come  for  the  pur- 
pose of  seeing  the  heiress,  of  whose  points  of  person  she 
delivered  a  judgement  critically  appreciative  as  a  horse- 
fancier's  on  the  racing  turf.  "  If  a  girl  like  that  holds  to 
it,  she  's  pretty  sure  to  get  him  at  last.  It 's  no  use  to 
pull  his  neck  down  to  the  water." 

Lady  Wathin  delicately  alluded  to  rumours  of  an 
entanglement,  an  admiration  he  had,  ahem. 

"A  married  woman,"  the  veteran  nodded.  "I  thought 
that  was  oft  ?  She  must  be  a  clever  intriguer  to  keep  him 
so  long." 

''She  is  undoubtedly  clever,"  said  Lady  Wathin,  and  it 
was  mumbled  in  her  hearing :  "  The  woman  seems  to  have 
a  taste  for  our  family." 

They  agreed  that  they  could  see  nothing  to  be  done. 
The  young  lady  must  wither,  Mrs.  Warwick  have  her  day. 
The  veteran  confided  her  experienced  why  to  Lady  Wathin : 
"  All  the  tales  you  tell  of  a  woman  of  that  sort  are  sharp 
sauce  to  the  palates  of  men." 

They  might  be,  to  the  men  of  the  dreadful  gilded  idle 
class  ! 

Mrs.  Warwick's  day  appeared  indefinitely  prolonged, 
judging  by  Percy  Dacier's  behaviour  to  Miss  Asper. 
Lady  Wathin  watched  them  narrowly  when  she  had  the 
chance,  a  little  ashamed  of  her  sex,  or  indignant  rather  at 


MATTER   FOR   SUBSEQUENT   EXPLOSION  257 

his  display  of  courtliness  in  exchange  for  her  open  betrayal 
of  her  preference.  It  was  almost  to  be  wished  that  she 
would  punish  him  by  sacrificing  herself  to  one  of  her  many 
brilliant  proposals  of  marriage.  But  such  are  women  !  — 
precisely  because  of  his  holding  back  he  tightened  the 
cord  attaching  him  to  her  tenacious  heart.  This  was  the 
truth.  For  the  rest,  he  was  gracefully  courteous;  an  ob- 
server could  perceive  the  charm  he  exercised.  He  talked 
with  a  ready  affability,  latterly  with  greater  social  ease; 
evidently  not  acting  the  indifferent  conqueror,  or  so  con- 
summately acting  it  as  to  mask  the  air.  And  yet  he  was 
ambitious,  and  he  was  not  rich.  Notoriously  was  he 
ambitious,  and  with  wealth  to  back  him,  a  great  entertain- 
ing house,  troops  of  adherents,  he  would  gather  influence, 
be  propelled  to  leadership.  The  vexation  of  a  constant 
itch  to  speak  to  him  on  the  subject,  and  the  recognition 
that  he  knew  it  all  as  well  as  she,  tormented  Lady  Wathin. 
He  gave  her  comforting  news  of  her  dear  cousin  in  the 
Winter. 

"You  have  heard  from  Mrs.  Warwick?"  she  said. 

He  replied,  "I  had  the  latest  from  Mr.  Kedworth." 

"Mrs.  Warwick  has  relinquished  her  post  ?  " 

"When  she  does,  you  may  be  sure  that  Lady  Dunstane 
is  perfectly  re-established." 

"She  is  an  excellent  nurse." 

"The  best,  I  believe." 

"It  is  a  good  quality  in  sickness." 

"Proof  of  good  all  through." 

"Her  husband  might  have  the  advantage  of  it.  His 
state  is  really  pathetic.  If  she  has  feeling,  and  could 
only  be  made  aware,  she  might  perhaps  be  persuaded  to 
pass  from  the  friendly  to  the  wifely  duty." 

Mr.  Dacier  bent  his  head  to  listen,  and  he  bowed. 

He  was  fast  in  the  toils ;  and  though  we  have  assurance 
that  evil  cannot  triumph  in  perpetuity,  the  aspect  of  it 
throning  provokes  a  kind  of  despair.  How  strange  if 
ultimately  the  lawyers  once  busy  about  the  uncle  were  to 
take  up  the  case  of  the  nephew,  and  this  time  reverse  the 
issue,  by  proving  it!  For  poor  Mr.  Warwick  was  emphatic 
on  the  question  of  his  honour.  It  excited  him  danger- 
ously.    He  was  long-suffering,  but  with  the  slightest  clue 

17 


258  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

terrible.     The  unknotting  of  the  entanglement  might  thus 
happen :  —  and  Constance  Asper  would  welcome  her  hero 

still. 

Meanwhile  there  was  actually  nothing  to  be  done:  a 
deplorable  absence  of  motive  villainy;  apparently  an 
absence  of  the  beneficent  Power  directing  events  to  their 
proper  termination.  Lady  Wathin  heard  of  her  cousin's 
having  been  removed  to  Cowes  in  May,  for  light  Solent 
and  Channel  voyages  on  board  Lord  Esquart's  yacht.  She 
heard  also  of  heavy  failures  and  convulsions  in  the  City 
of  London,  quite  unconscious  that  the  Fates,  or  agents  of 
the  Providence  she  invoked  to  precipitate  the  catastrophe, 
were  then  beginning  cavernously  their  performance  of 
the  part  of  villain  in  Diana's  history. 

Diana  and  Emma  enjoyed  happy  quiet  sailings  under 
May  breezes  on  the  many-coloured  South-western  waters, 
heart  in  heart  again;  the  physical  weakness  of  the  one, 
the  moral  weakness  of  the  other,  creating  that  mutual 
dependency  which  makes  friendship  a  pulsating  tie. 
Diana's  confession  had  come  of  her  letter  to  Emma. 
When  the  latter  was  able  to  examine  her  correspondence, 
Diana  brought  her  the  heap  for  perusal,  her  own  sealed 
scribble,  throbbing  with  all  the  fatal  might-have-been, 
under  her  eyes.  She  could  have  concealed  and  destroyed 
it.  She  sat  beside  her  friend,  awaiting  her  turn,  hearing 
her  say  at  the  superscription:  "Your  writing,  Tony?"  and 
she  nodded.  She  was  asked:  "Shall  I  read  it?"  She 
answered:  "Eead."  They  were  soon  locked  in  an  embrace. 
Emma  had  no  perception  of  coldness  through  those  brief 
dry  lines ;  her  thought  was  of  the  matter. 

"The  danger  is  over  now?"  she  said. 

"Yes,  that  danger  is  over  now." 

"You  have  weathered  it?" 

"I  love  him." 

Emma  dropped  a  heavy  sigh  in  pity  of  her,  remotely  in 
compassion  for  Eedworth,  the  loving  and  unbeloved.  She 
was  too  humane  and  wise  of  our  nature  to  chide  her  Tony 
for  having  her  sex's  heart.  She  had  charity  to  bestow  on 
women;  in  defence  of  them  against  men  and  the  world,  it 
was  a  charity  armed  with  the  weapons  of  battle.  The  wife 
madly  stripped  before  the  world  by  a  jealous  husband, 


MATTER   FOR   SUBSEQUENT  EXPLOSION  259 

and  left  cliained  to  the  rock,  her  youth  wasting,  her  blood 
arrested,  her  sensibilities  chilled  and  assailing  her  under 
their  multitudinous  disguises,  and  for  whom  the  world  is 
merciless,  called  forth  Emma's  tenderest  commiseration; 
and  that  wife  being  Tony,  and  stricken  with  the  curse  of 
love,  in  other  circumstances  the  blessing,  Emma  bled  for 
her. 

"  But  nothing  desperate  ?  "  she  said. 

"No;  you  have  saved  me." 

"I  would  knock  at  death's  doors  again,  and  pass  them, 
to  be  sure  of  that." 

"  Kiss  me ;  you  may  be  sure.  I  would  not  put  my  lips 
to  your  cheek  if  there  were  danger  of  my  faltering." 

"But  you  love  him." 

"I  do :  and  because  I  love  him  I  will  not  let  him  be 
fettered  to  me." 

"You  will  see  him." 

"Do  not  imagine  that  his  persuasions  undermined  your 
Tony.     I  am  subject  to  panics." 

"  Was  it  your  husband  ?  " 

"  I  had  a  visit  from  Lady  Wathin.  She  knows  him. 
She  came  as  peacemaker.  She  managed  to  hint  at  his 
authority.  Then  came  a  letter  from  him  —  of  supplica- 
tion, interpenetrated  with  the  hint:  a  suifused  atmosphere. 
Upon  that,  unexpected  by  me,  my  —  let  me  call  him  so 
once,  forgive  me !  —  lover  came.  Oh  !  he  loves  me,  or  did 
then.  Percy !  He  had  been  told  that  I  should  be  claimed. 
I  felt  myself  the  creature  I  am  —  a  wreck  of  marriage. 
But  I  fancied  I  could  serve  him :  —  I  saw  golden.  My 
vanity  was  the  chief  traitor.  Cowardice  of  course  played 
a  part.  In  few  things  that  we  do,  where  self  is  concerned, 
will  cowardice  not  be  found.  And  the  hallucination 
colours  it  to  seem  a  lovely  heroism.  That  was  the  second 
time  Mr.  Redworth  arrived.  I  am  always  at  cross  ways, 
and  he  rescues  me;  on  this  occasion  unknowingly." 

"  There  's  a  divinity  "...  said  Emma.  "  When  I  think 
of  it  I  perceive  that  Patience  is  our  beneficent  fairy  god- 
mother, who  brings  us  our  harvest  in  the  long  result." 

"My  dear,  does  she  bring  us  our  labourers'  rations,  to 
sustain  us  for  the  day?  "  said  Diana. 

"Poor  fare,  but  enough." 


260  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"I  fear  I  was  born  godmotherless." 

"  You  have  stores  of  patience,  Tony ;  only  now  and  then 
fits  of  desperation." 

"My  nature's  frailty,  the  gap  in  it:  we  will  give  it  no 
fine  names  —  they  cover  our  pitfalls.  I  am  open  to  be 
carried  on  a  tide  of  unreasonableness  when  the  coward 
cries  out.  But  I  can  say,  dear,  that  after  one  rescue,  a 
similar  temptation  is  unlikely  to  master  me.  I  do  not 
subscribe  to  the  world's  decrees  for  love  of  the  monster, 
though  I  am  beginning  to  understand  the  dues  of  alle- 
giance. We  have  ceased  to  write  letters.  You  may  have 
faith  in  me." 

"  I  have,  with  my  whole  soul,"  said  Emma. 

So  the  confession  closed;  and  in  the  present  instance 
there  were  not  any  forgotten  chambers  to  be  unlocked  and 
ransacked  for  addenda  confessions. 

The  subjects  discoursed  of  by  the  two  endeared  the  hours 
to  them.  They  were  aware  that  the  English  of  the  period 
would  have  laughed  a  couple  of  women  to  scorn  for  ven- 
turing on  them,  and  they  were  not  a  little  hostile  in  con- 
sequence, and  shot  their  epigrams  profusely,  applauding 
the  keener  that  appeared  to  score  the  giant  bulk  of  their 
intolerant  enemy,  who  holds  the  day,  but  not  tlie  morrow. 
Us  too  he  holds  for  the  day,  to  punish  us  if  we  have  tem- 
poral cravings.  He  scatters  his  gifts  to  the  abject;  toss- 
ing to  us  rebels  bare  dog-biscuit.  But  the  life  of  the 
spirit  is  beyond  his  region;  we  have  our  morrow  in  his 
day  when  we  crave  nought  of  him.  Diana  and  Emma 
delighted  to  discover  that  they  were  each  the  rebel  of  their 
earlier  and  less  experienced  years,  each  a  member  of  the 
malcontent  minor  faction,  the  salt  of  earth,  to  whom  their 
salt  must  serve  for  nourishment,  as  they  admitted,  relish- 
ing it  determinedly,  not  without  gratification. 

Sir  Lukin  was  busy  upon  his  estate  in  Scotland.  They 
summoned  young  Arthur  Ehodes  to  the  island,  that  he 
might  have  a  taste  of  the  new  scenes.  Diana  was  always 
wishing  for  his  instruction  and  refreshment;  and  Ked- 
worth  came  to  spend  a  Saturday  and  Sunday  with  them, 
and  showed  his  disgust  of  the  idle  boy,  as  usual,  at  the 
same  time  consulting  them  on  the  topic  of  furniture  for 
the   Berkshire   mansion   he   had   recently  bought,   rather 


MATTER  FOR   SUBSEQUENT   EXPLOSION  261 

vaunting  the  Spanish  pictures  his  commissioner  in  Madrid 
was  transmitting.  The  pair  of  rebels,  vexed  by  his  treat- 
ment of  the  respectful  junior,  took  him  for  an  incarnation 
of  their  enemy,  and  pecked  and  worried  the  man  aston- 
ishingly. He  submitted  to  it  like  the  placable  giant. 
Yes,  he  was  a  Liberal,  and  furnishing  and  decorating 
thes,  house  in  the  stability  of  which  he  trusted.  Why  not? 
We  must  accept  the  world  as  it  is,  try  to  improve  it  by 
degrees.  —  Not  so :  humanity  will  not  wait  for  you,  the 
victims  are  shrieking  beneath  the  bricks  of  your  enor- 
mous edifice,  behind  the  canvas  of  your  pictures.  "But 
-you  may  really  say  that  luxurious  yachting  is  an  odd  kind 
of  insurgency,^'  avowed  Diana.  "It's  the  tangle  we 
are  in." 

"It 's  the  coat  we  have  to  wear;  and  why  fret  at  it  for 
being  comfortable?  " 

"  I  don't  half  enough,  when  I  think  of  my  shivering 
neighbours." 

"Money  is  of  course  a  rough  test  of  virtue,"  said  Eed- 
worth.     "We  have  no  other  general  test." 

Money!  The  ladies  proclaimed  it  a  mere  material  test; 
Diana,  gazing  on  sunny  sea,  with  an  especial  disdain. 
And  name  us  your  sort  of  virtue.  There  is  more  virtue 
in  poverty.  He  denied  that.  Inflexibly  British,  he  de- 
clared money,  and  also  the  art  of  getting  money,  to  be 
hereditary  virtues,  deserving  of  their  reward.  The  reward 
a  superior  wealth  and  its  fruits?  Yes,  the  power  to  enjoy 
and  spread  enjoyment:  and  let  idleness  envy  both!  He 
abused  idleness,  and  by  implication  the  dilettante  insur- 
gency fostering  it.  However,  he  was  compensatingly 
heterodox  in  his  view  of  the  Law's  persecution  of  women; 
their  pertinacious  harpings  on  the  theme  had  brought  him 
to  that;  and  in  consideration  of  the  fact,  as  they  looked 
from  yacht  to  shore,  of  their  being  rebels  participating 
largely  in  the  pleasures  of  the  tyrant's  court,  they  allowed 
him  to  silence  them,  and  forgave  him. 

Thoughts  upon  money  and  idleness  were  in  confusion 
with  Diana.  She  had  a  household  to  support  in  London, 
and  she  was  not  working;  she  could  not  touch  The 
Cantatrice  while  Emma  was  near.  Possibly,  she  again 
ejaculated,  the  Kedworths  of  the  world  were  right:  the 


262  DIANA  OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

fruitful  labours  were  with,  the  mattock  and  hoe,  or  the 
mind  directing  them.  It  was  a  crushing  invasion  of  mate- 
rialism, so  she  proposed  a  sail  to  the  coast  of  France,  and 
thither  they  flew,  touching  Cherbourg,  Alderney,  Sark, 
Guernsey,  and  sighting  the  low  Brittany  rocks.  Memo- 
rable days  to  Arthur  Khodes.  He  saw  perpetually  the 
one  golden  centre  in  new  scenes.  He  heard  her  voice,  he 
treasured  her  sayings;  her  gestures,  her  play  of  lip  and 
eyelid,  her  lift  of  head,  lightest  movements,  were  imprinted 
on  him,  surely  as  the  heavens  are  mirrored  in  the  quiet 
seas,  firmly  and  richly  as  eartli  answers  to  the  sprinkled 
grain.  For  he  was  blissfully  athirst,  untroubled  by  a 
hope.  She  gave  him  more  than  she  knew  of:  a  present 
that  kept  its  beating  heart  into  the  future;  a  height  of 
sky,  a  belief  in  nobility,  permanent  through  manhood 
down  to  age.  She  was  his  foam-born  Goddess  of  those 
leaping  waters;  differently  hued,  crescented,  a  different 
influeuce.  He  had  a  happy  week,  and  it  charmed  Diana 
to  hear  him  tell  her  so.  In  spite  of  Eedworth,  she  had 
faith  in  the  fruit-bearing  powers  of  a  time  of  simple  hap- 
piness, and  shared  the  youth's  in  reflecting  it.  Only  the 
happiness  must  be  simple,  that  of  the  glass  to  the  lovely 
face :  no  straining  of  arms  to  retain ,  no  heaving  of  the 
bosom  in  vacancy. 

His  poverty  and  capacity  for  pure  enjoyment  led  her  to 
think  of  him  almost  clingingly  when  hard  news  reached 
her  from  the  quaint  old  City  of  London,  which  despises 
poverty  and  authorcraft  and  all  mean  adventurers,  and 
bows  to  the  lordly  merchant,  the  mighty  financier,  Eed- 
worth's  incarnation  of  the  virtues.  Happy  days  on  board 
the  yacht  Clarissa  !  Diana  had  to  recall  them  with  effort. 
They  who  sow  their  money  for  a  promising  high  percentage 
have  built  their  habitations  on  the  sides  of  the  most  erup- 
tive mountain  in  Europe,  ^tna  supplies  more  certain 
harvests,  wrecks  fewer  vineyards  and  peaceful  dwellings. 
The  greed  of  gain  is  our  volcano.  Her  wonder  leapt  up 
at  the  slight  inducement  she  had  received  to  embark  her 
money  in  this  Company:  a  South-American  mine,  collapsed 
almost  within  hearing  of  the  trumpets  of  prospectus,  after 
two  punctual  payments  of  the  half-yearly  interest.  A  Mrs. 
Ferdinand  Cherson,   an   elder   sister  of  the  pretty  Mrs. 


MATTER  FOR   SUBSEQUENT  EXPLOSION  263 

Fryar-Gunnett,  had  talked  to  her  of  the  cost  of  things  one 
afternoon  at  Lady  Singleby's  garden-party,  and  spoken  of 
the  City  as  the  place  to  help  to  swell  an  income,  if  only 
you  have  an  acquaintance  with  some  of  the  chief  City 
men.  The  great  mine  was  named,  and  the  rush  for  allot- 
ments. She  knew  a  couple  of  the  Directors.  They  vowed 
to  her  that  ten  per  cent,  was  a  trifle;  the  fortune  to  be 
expected  out  of  the  mine  was  already  clearly  estimable  at 
forties  and  fifties.  For  their  part  they  anticipated  cent. 
per  cent.  Mrs.  Cherson  said  she  wanted  money,  and  had 
therefore  invested  in  the  mine.  It  seemed  so  consequent, 
the  cost  of  things  being  enormous  !  She  and  her  sister 
Mrs.  Fryar-Gunnett  owned  husbands  who  did  their  bid- 
ding, because  of  their  having  the  brains,  it  might  be  under- 
stood. Thus  five  thousand  pounds  invested  would  speedily 
bring  five  thousand  pounds  per  annum.  Diana  had  often 
dreamed  of  the  City  of  London  as  the  seat  of  magic;  and 
taking  the  City's  contempt  for  authorcraft  and  the  intan- 
gible as,  from  its  point  of  view,  justly  founded,  she  had 
mixed  her  dream  strangely  with  an  ancient  notion  of  the 
City's  probity.  Her  broker's  shaking  head  did  not  damp 
her  ardour  for  shares  to  the  full  amount  of  her  ability  to 
purchase.  She  remembered  her  satisfaction  at  the  allot- 
ment; the  golden  castle  shot  up  from  this  fountain  mine. 
She  had  a  frenzy  for  mines  and  fished  in  some  English 
with  smaller  sums.  "I  am  now  a  miner,"  she  had  ex- 
claimed, between  dismay  at  her  audacity  and  the  pride  of 
it.  Why  had  she  not  consulted  Eedworth?  He  would 
peremptorily  have  stopped  the  frenzy  in  its  first  intoxi- 
cating effervescence.  She,  like  Mrs.  Cherson,  like  all 
women  who  have  plunged  upon  the  cost  of  things,  wanted 
money.  She  naturally  went  to  the  mine.  Address  him 
for  counsel  in  the  person  of  dupe,  she  could  not;  shame 
was  a  barrier.  Could  she  tell  him  that  the  prattle  of  a 
woman,  spendthrift  as  Mrs.  Cherson,  had  induced  her  to 
risk  her  money?  Latterly  the  reports  of  Mrs.  Fryar- 
Gunnett  were  not  of  the  flavour  to  make  association  of 
their  names  agreeable  to  his  hearing. 

She  had  to  sit  down  in  the  buzz  of  her  self-reproaches 
and  amazement  at  the  behaviour  of  that  reputable  City, 
shrug,  and  recommence  the  labour  of  her  pen.     Material 


264  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

misfortune  had  this  one  advantage ;  it  kept  her  from  spec- 
ulative thoughts  of  her  lover,  and  the  meaning  of  his 
absence  and  silence. 

Diana's  perusal  of  the  incomplete  Caktateice  was  done 
with  the  cold  critical  eye  interpreting  for  the  public.  She 
was  forced  to  write  on  nevertheless,  and  exactly  in  the 
ruts  of  the  foregoing  matter.  It  propelled  her.  No  longer 
perversely,  of  necessity  she  wrote  her  best,  convinced  that 
the  work  was  doomed  to  unpopularity,  resolved  that  it 
should  be  at  least  a  victory  in  style.  A  fit  of  angry  cyni- 
cism now  and  then  set  her  composing  phrases  as  baits  for 
the  critics  to  quote,  condemnatory  of  the  attractiveness  of 
the  work.  Her  mood  was  bad.  In  addition,  she  found 
Whitmonby  cool;  he  complained  of  the  coolness  of  her 
letter  of  adieu;  complained  of  her  leaving  London  so  long. 
How  could  she  expect  to  be  his  Queen  of  the  London  Salon 
if  she  lost  touch  of  the  topics?  He  made  no  other  allu- 
sion. They  were  soon  on  amicable  terms,  at  the  expense 
of  flattering  arts  that  she  had  not  hitherto  practised.  But 
Westlake  revealed  unimagined  marvels  of  the  odd  corners 
of  the  masculine  bosom.  He  was  the  man  of  her  circle 
the  neatest  in  epigram,  the  widest  of  survey,  an  Oriental 
traveller,  a  distinguished  writer,  and  if  not  personally 
bewitching,  remarkably  a  gentleman  of  the  world.  He 
was  wounded ;  he  said  as  much.  It  came  to  this :  admit- 
ting that  he  had  no  claims,  he  declared  it  to  be  unbearable 
for  him  to  see  another  preferred.  The  happier  was  un- 
mentioned,  and  Diana  scraped  his  wound  by  rallying  him. 
He  repeated  that  he  asked  only  to  stand  on  equal  terms 
with  the  others;  her  preference  of  one  was  past  his  toler- 
ance. She  told  him  that  since  leaving  Lady  Dunstane  she 
had  seen  but  Whitmonby,  Wilmers,  and  him.  He  smiled 
sarcastically,  saying  he  had  never  had  a  letter  from  her, 
except  the  formal  one  of  invitation. 

"Powers  of  blarney,  have  you  forsaken  a  daughter  of 
Erin?"  cried  Diana.  "Here  is  a  friend  who  has  a  crav- 
ing for  you,  and  I  talk  sense  to  him.  I  have  written  to 
none  of  my  set  since  I  last  left  London." 

She  pacified  him  by  doses  of  cajolery  new  to  her  tongue. 
She  liked  him,  abhorred  the  thought  of  losing  any  of  hei 
friends,  so  the  cajoling  sentences  ran  until  Westlake  be- 


MATTER   FOR   SUBSEQXTENT  EXPLOSION  ^65 

trayed  an  inflammable  composition,  and  had  to  be  put  out, 
and  smoked  sullenly.  Her  resources  were  tried  in  restor- 
ing him  to  reason.  The  months  of  absence  from  London 
appeared  to  have  transformed  her  world.  Tonans  was 
moderate.  The  great  editor  rebuked  her  for  her  prolonged 
absence  from  London,  not  so  much  because  it  discrowned 
her  as  Queen  of  the  Salon,  but  candidly  for  its  rendering 
her  service  less  to  him.  Everything  she  knew  of  men  and 
affairs  was  to  him  stale. 

"  How  do  you  get  to  the  secrets  ?  "  she  asked. 

"By  sticking  to  the  centre  of  them,^'  he  said. 

"  But  how  do  you  manage  to  be  in  advance  and  act  the 
prophet?  " 

"Because  I  will  have  them  at  any  price,  and  that  is 
known." 

She  hinted  at  the  peccant  City  Company. 

"I  think  I  have  checked  the  mining  mania,  as  I 
did  the  railway,"  said  he;  "and  so  far  it  was  a  public 
service.     There  's  no  checking  of  maniacs." 

She  took  her  whipping  within  and  without.  ^^  On  an- 
other occasion  I  shall  apply  to  you,  Mr.  Tonans." 

"  Ah,  there  was  a  time  when  you  could  have  been  a 
treasure  to  me,"  he  rejoined ;  alluding  of  course  to  the 
Dannisburgh  days. 

In  dejection,  as  she  mused  on  those  days,  and  on  her 
foolish  ambition  to  have  a  London  house  where  her  light 
might  burn,  she  advised  herself,  with  Redworth's  voice,  to 
quit  the  house,  arrest  expenditure,  and  try  for  happiness 
by  burning  and  shining  in  the  spirit :  devoting  herself,  as 
Arthur  Rhodes  did,  purely  to  literature.  It  became  almost 
a  decision. 

Percy  she  had  still  neither  written  to  nor  heard  from, 
and  she  dared  not  hope  to  meet  him.  She  fancied  a  wish 
to  have  tidings  of  his  marriage:  it  would  be  peace,  if  in 
desolation.  Now  that  she  had  confessed  and  given  her 
pledge  to  Emma,  she  had  so  far  broken  with  him  as  to 
render  the  holding  him  chained  a  cruelty,  and  his  reserve 
whispered  of  a  rational  acceptance  of  the  end  between 
them.  She  thanked  him  for  it ;  an  act  whereby  she  was 
instantly  melted  to  such  softness  that  a  dread  of  him 
haunted  her.     Coward,  take  up  your  burden  for  armour ! 


266  DIANA   OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

she  called  to  her  poor  dungeoned  self  wailing  to  have  com* 
mon  nourishment.  She  knew  how  prodigiously  it  waxed 
on  crumbs  ;  nay,  on  the  imagination  of  small  morsels.  By 
way  of  chastizing  it,  she  reviewed  her  life,  her  behaviour 
to  her  husband,  until  she  sank  backward  to  a  depth  de- 
prived of  air  and  light.  That  life  with  her  husband  was 
a  dungeon  to  her  nature  deeper  than  any  imposed  by  pres- 
ent conditions.  She  was  then  a  revolutionary  to  reach  to 
the  breath  of  day.  She  had  now  to  be  only  not  a  coward, 
and  she  could  breathe  as  others  did.  "Women  who  sap 
the  moral  laws  pull  down  the  pillars  of  the  temple  on  their 
sex,"  Emma  had  said.  Diana  perceived  something  of  her 
personal  debt  to  civilization.  Her  struggles  passed  into 
the  doomed  Cantatrice  occupying  days  and  nights  under 
pressure  for  immediate  payment ;  the  silencing  of  friend 
Debit,  ridiculously  calling  himself  Credit,  in  contempt  of 
sex  and  conduct,  on  the  ground  that  he  was  he  solely  by 
virtue  of  being  she.  He  had  got  a  trick  of  singing  operatic 
solos  in  the  form  and  style  of  the  delightful  tenor  Tellio, 
and  they  were  touching  in  absurdity,  most  real  in  unreality. 
Exquisitely  trilled,  after  Tellio's  manner, 

"  The  tradesmen  all  beseech  ye, 
The  landlord,  cook  and  maid, 
Complete  The  Cantatrice, 
That  they  may  soon  be  paid/* 

provoked  her  to  laughter  in  pathos.  He  approached,  pos- 
turing himself  operatically,  with  perpetual  new  verses, 
rhymes  to  Danvers,  rhymes  to  Madame  Sybille,  the  cook. 
Seeing  Tellio  at  one  of  Henry  Wilmers'  private  concerts, 
Diana's  lips  twitched  to  dimples  at  the  likeness  her  familiar 
had  assumed.  She  had  to  compose  her  countenance  to  talk 
to  him  ;  but  the  moment  of  song  was  the  trial.  Lady 
Singleby  sat  beside  her,  and  remarked  :  "  You  have  always 
fun  going  on  in  you  !  "  She  partook  of  the  general  impres- 
sion that  Diana  Warwick  was  too  humorous  to  nurse  a 
downright  passion. 

Before  leaving,  she  engaged  Diana  to  her  annual  garden- 
party  of  the  closing  season,  and  there  the  meeting  with 
Percy  occurred,  not  unobserved.  Had  they  been  overheard, 
very  little  to  implicate  them  would  have  been  gathered. 


MATTER   FOR   SUBSEQUENT  EXPLOSION  267 

He  walked  in  full  view  across  the  lawn  to  her,  and  they 
presented  mask  to  mask. 

"  The  beauty  of  the  day  tempts  you  at  last,  Mrs.  War- 
wick." 

"  I  have  been  finishing  a  piece  of  work." 

Lovely  weather,  beautiful  dresses  :  agreed.  Diana  wore 
a  yellow  robe  with  a  black  bonnet,  and  he  commented  on 
the  becoming  hues ;  for  the  first  time,  he  noticed  her 
dress !  Lovely  women  ?  Dacier  hesitated.  One  he  saw. 
But  surely  he  must  admire  Mrs.  Fryar-Gunnett  ?  And 
who  steps  beside  her,  transparently  fascinated,  with  visage 
at  three-quarters  to  the  rays  within  her  bonnet  ?  Can  it  be 
Sir  Lukin  Dunstane  ?  and  beholding  none  but  his  charmer  ! 

Dacier  withdrew  his  eyes  thoughtfully  from  the  spectacle, 
and  moved  to  woo  Diana  to  a  stroll.  She  could  not  restrain 
her  feet ;  she  was  out  of  the  ring  of  her  courtiers  for  the 
moment.     He  had  seized  his  opportunity. 

'^  It  is  nearly  a  year  !  "  he  said. 

"I  have  been  nursing  nearly  all  the  time,  doing  the 
work  I  do  best." 

"  Unaltered  ?  " 

"  A  year  must  leave  its  marks." 

"  Tony  !  " 

"  You  speak  of  a  madwoman,  a  good  eleven  months  dead. 
Let  her  rest.     Those  are  the  conditions." 

"  Accepted,  if  I  may  see  her." 

"  Honestly  accepted  ?  " 

"  Imposed  fatally,  I  have  to  own.  I  have  felt  with  you  : 
you  are  the  wiser.  But,  admitting  that,  surely  we  can 
meet.     I  may  see  you  ?  " 

"  My  house  has  not  been  shut." 

"  I  respected  the  house.     I  distrusted  myself.^* 

"  What  restores  your  confidence  ?  " 

"  The  strength  I  draw  from  you." 

One  of  the  Beauties  at  a  garden-party  is  lucky  to  get  as 
many  minutes  as  had  passed  in  quietness.  Diana  was  met 
and  captured.  But  those  last  words  of  Percy's  renewed 
her  pride  in  him  by  suddenly  building  a  firm  faith  in  her- 
self. jSToblest  of  lovers  !  she  thought,  and  brooded  on  the 
little  that  had  been  spoken,  the  much  conveyed,  for  a  proof 
of  perfect  truthfulness. 


268  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

The  world  had  watched  them.  It  pronounced  tliem  dis- 
creet if  culpable;  probably  cold  to  the  passion  both.  Of 
Dacier's  coldness  it  had  no  doubt,  and  Diana's  was  presumed 
from  her  comical  flights  of  speech.  She  was  given  to  him 
because  of  the  known  failure  of  her  other  adorers.  He  in 
the  front  rank  of  politicians  attracted  her  with  the  lustre 
of  his  ambition ;  she  him  with  her  mingling  of  talent  and 
beauty.  An  astute  world;  right  in  the  main,  owing  to  per- 
ceptions based  upon  brute  nature;  utterly  astray  in  par- 
ticulars, for  the  reason  that  it  takes  no  count  of  the  soul  of 
man  or  woman.  Hence  its  glee  at  a  catastrophe;  its  poor 
stock  of  mercy.  And  when  no  catastrophe  follows,  the 
prophet,  for  the  honour  of  the  profession,  must  decry  her 
as  cunning  beyond  aught  yet  revealed  of  a  serpent  sex. 

Save  for  a  word  or  two,  the  watchman  might  have  over- 
heard and  trumpeted  his  report  of  their  interview  at  Diana's 
house.  After  the  first  pained  breathing,  when  they  found 
themselves  ajone  in  that  room  where  they  had  plighted 
their  fortunes,  they  talked  allusively  to  define  the  terms 
imposed  on  them  by  Reason.  The  thwarted  step  was  un- 
mentioned;  it  was  a  past  madness.  But  Wisdom  being 
recognized,  they  could  meet.  It  would  be  hard  if  that  were 
denied !  They  talked  very  little  of  their  position ;  both 
understood  the  mutual  acceptance  of  it ;  and  now  that  he 
had  seen  her  and  was  again  under  the  spell,  Dacier's  rational 
mind,  together  with  his  delight  in  her  presence,  compelled 
him  honourably  to  bow  to  the  terms.  Only,  as  these  were 
severe  upon  lovers,  the  innocence  of  their  meetings  de- 
manded indemnification  in  frequency. 

"  Come  whenever  you  think  I  can  be  useful,"  said  Diana. 

They  pressed  hands  at  parting,  firmly  and  briefly,  not  for 
the  ordinary  dactylology  of  lovers,  but  in  sign  of  the  treaty 
of  amity. 

She  soon  learnt  that  she  had  tied  herself  to  her  costly 
household. 


THE  SUBJECT  OF  A  PORTRAIT         269 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

DIALOGUE     BOUND     THE     SUBJECT    OF     A     PORTRAIT,     WITH 
SOME   INDICATIONS    OF    THE    TASK    FOR    DIANA 

An   enamoured   Egeria   who   is   not   a  princess   in   her 
worldly  state  nor  a  goddess  by  origin  has  to  play  one  of 
those  parts  which  strain  the  woman's  faculties  past  natural- 
ness.    She  must   never  expose  her  feelings  to  her  lover ; 
she  must  make  her  counsel  weighty ;  otherwise  she  is  little 
his  nymph  of  the  pure  wells,  and  what  she  soon  may  be, 
the  world  will  say.     She  has  also,  most  imperatively,  to 
dazzle  him  without  the  betrayal  of  artifice,  where  simple 
spontaneousness   is   beyond   conjuring.     But  feelings  that 
are  constrained   becloud   the   judgement  besides   arresting 
the  fine  jet  of  delivery  wherewith  the  mastered  lover  is 
taught  through   his  ears  to  think  himself  prompted,  and 
submit  to  be  controlled,  by  a  creature  super-feminine.     She 
must  make  her  counsel  so  weighty  in  poignant  praises  as  to 
repress  impulses  that  would  rouse  her  own  ;  and  her  betray- 
ing impulsiveness  was  a  subject  of  reflection  to  Diana  after 
she  had  given  Percy  Dacier,  metaphorically,  the  key  of  her 
house.     Only  as   his   true   Egeria  could   she  receive   him. 
She  was  therefore  grateful,  she  thanked  and  venerated  this 
noblest  of  lovers  for  his  not  pressing  to  the  word  of  love, 
and  so  strengthening  her  to  point  his   mind,  freshen  his 
moral  energies    and  inspirit  him.     His  chivalrous  accept- 
ance of  the  conditions  of  their  renewed  intimacy  was  a  radi- 
ant knightliness  to  Diana,  elevating  her  with  a  living  image 
for  worship  :  —  he  so  near  once  to  being  the  absolute  lord 
of  her  destinies  !     How  to  reward  him,  was  her  sole  danger- 
ous thought.     She  prayed  and  strove  that  she  might  give 
him   of   her   best,  to    practically   help   him ;  and  she   had 
reason  to  suppose  she  could  do  it,  from  the  visible  effect  of 
her  phrases.     He  glistened  in  repeating  them  ;  he  had  fallen 
into  the  habit ;  before  witnesses   too ;  in  the  presence  of 
Miss  Paynham,  who  had  taken  earnestly  to  the  art  of  paint- 
ing, and  obtained  her  dear  Mrs.  Warwick's  promise  of  a 
few  sittings  for  the  sketch  of  a  portrait,  near  the  close  of 


270  DIANA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

the  season.  "  A  very  daring  thing  to  attempt,"  Miss  Payn« 
ham  said,  when  he  was  comparing  her  first  outlines  and  the 
beautiful  breathing  features.  "Even  if  one  gets  the  face, 
the  lips  will  seem  speechless,  to  those  who  know  her." 

"  If  they  have  no  recollection,"  said  Dacier. 

"  I  mean,  the  endeavour  should  be  to  represent  them  at 
the  moment  of  speaking." 

"  Put  it  into  the  eyes."     He  looked  at  the  eyes. 

She  looked  at  the  mouth.  "  But  it  is  the  mouth,  more 
than  the  eyes.'" 

He  looked  at  the  face.  "  Where  there  is  character,  you 
have  only  to  study  it  to  be  sure  of  a  likeness." 

"That  is  the  task,  with  one  who  utters  jewels,  Mr. 
Dacier." 

"Bright  wit,  I  fear,  is  above  the  powers  of  your  art." 

"  Still  I  feel  it  could  be  done.     See  —  now  —  that !  " 

Diana's  lips  had  opened  to  say :  "  Confess  me  a  model 
model :  I  am  dissected  while  I  sit  for  portrayal.  I  must  be 
for  a  moment  like  the  frog  of  the  two  countrymen  who  were 
disputing  as  to  the  manner  of  his  death,  when  he  stretched 
to  yawn,  upon  which  they  agreed  that  he  had  defeated  the 
truth  for  both  of  them.     I  am  not  quite  inanimate." 

"  Irish  countrymen,"  said  Dacier. 

"The  story  adds,  that  blows  were  arrested;  so  confer 
the  nationality  as  you  please." 

Diana  had  often  to  divert  him  from  a  too  intent  perusal 
of  her  features  with  sparkles  and  stories  current  or  invented 
to  serve  the  immediate  purpose. 

Miss  Paynham  was  Mrs.  Warwick's  guest  for  a  fortnight, 
and  observed  them  together.  She  sometimes  charitably 
laid  down  her  pencil  and  left  them,  having  forgotten  this 
or  that.  They  were  conversing  of  general  matters  with 
their  usual  crisp  precision  on  her  return,  and  she  was 
rather  like  the  two  countrymen,  in  debating  whether  it  was 
excess  of  coolness  or  discreetness  ;  though  she  was  con- 
vinced of  their  inclinations,  and  expected  love  some  day 
to  be  leaping  up.  Diana  noticed  that  she  had  no  reminder 
for  leaving  the  room  when  it  was  Mr.  Eed  worth  present. 
These  two  had  become  very  friendly,  according  to  her 
hopes ;  and  Miss  Paynham  was  extremely  solicitous  to  draw 
suggestions  from  Mr.  Kedworth  and  win  his  approval. 


THE  SUBJECT   OF   A   PORTRAIT  271 

"  Do  I  appear  likely  to  catch  the  mouth  now,  do  you 
think,  Mr.  Redworth?" 

He  remarked,  smiling  at  Diana's  expressive  dimple,  that 
the  mouth  was  difficult  to  catch.  He  did  not  gaze  intently. 
Mr.  Redworth  was  the  genius  of  friendship,  "  the  friend  of 
women,"  Mrs.  Warwick  had  said  of  him.  Miss  Paynham 
discovered  it,  as  regarded  herself.  The  portrait  was  his 
commission  to  her,  kindly  proposed,  secretly  of  course,  to 
give  her  occupation  and  the  chance  of  winning  a  vogue  with 
the  face  of  a  famous  Beauty.  So  many,  however,  were 
Mrs.  Warwick's  visitors,  and  so  lively  the  chatter  she 
directed,  that  accurate  sketching  was  difficult  to  an  ama- 
teurish hand.  Whitmonby,  Sullivan  Smith,  Westlake, 
Henry  Wilmers,  Arthur  Rhodes,  and  other  gentlemen, 
literary  and  military,  were  almost  daily  visitors  when  it 
became  known  that  the  tedium  of  the  beautiful  sitter  re- 
quired beguiling,  and  there  was  a  certainty  of  finding  her 
at  home.  On  Mrs.  Warwick's  Wednesday  numerous  ladies 
decorated  the  group.  Then  was  heard  such  a  rillet  of 
dialogue  without  scandal  or  politics,  as  nowhere  else  in 
Britain  ;  all  vowed  it  subsequently ;  for  to  the  remembrance 
it  seemed  magical.  JSTot  a  breath  of  scandal,  and  yet  the 
liveliest  flow.  Lady  Pennon  came  attended  by  a  Mr. 
Alexander  Hepburn,  a  handsome  Scot,  at  whom  Dacier  shot 
one  of  his  instinctive  keen  glances,  before  seeing  that  the 
hostess  had  mounted  a  transient  colour.  Mr.  Hepburn,  in 
settling  himself  on  his  chair  rather  too  briskly,  contrived 
the  next  minute  to  break  a  precious  bit  of  China  standing  by 
his  elbow ;  and  Lady  Pennon  cried  out,  with  sympathetic 
anguish :  "  Oh,  my  dear,  what  a  trial  for  you !  " 

"  Brittle  is  foredoomed,"  said  Diana,  unruffled. 

She  deserved  compliments,  and  would  have  had  them  if 
she  had  not  wounded  the  most  jealous  and  petulant  of  her 
courtiers. 

"  Then  the  Turk  is  a  sapient  custodian  !  "  said  Westlake, 
vexed  with  her  flush  at  the  entrance  of  the  Scot. 

Diana  sedately  took  his  challenge.  "  We,  Mr.  Westlake, 
have  the  philosophy  of  ownership." 

Mr.  Hepburn  penitentially  knelt  to  pick  up  the  fragments, 
and  Westlake  murmured  over  his  head:  ''As  long  as  it  is 
we  who  are  the  cracked." 


272  DIANA   OF   THE  CKOSSWAYS 

"  Did  we  not  start  from  China  ?*' 

"  We  were  consequently  precipitated  to  Stamboul." 

"  You  try  to  elude  the  lesson." 

"  I  remember  my  first  psedagogue  telling  me  so  when  he 
rapped  the  book  on  my  cranium." 

'^  The  mark  of  the  book  is  not  a  disfigurement." 

It  was  gently  worded,  and  the  shrewder  for  it.  The 
mark  of  the  book,  if  not  a  disfigurement,  was  a  character- 
istic of  Westlake's  fashion  of  speech.  Whitmonby  nodded 
twice,  for  signification  of  a  palpable  hit  in  that  bout;  and 
he  noted  within  him  the  foolishness  of  obtruding  the 
remotest  allusion  to  our  personality  when  crossing  the  foils 
with  a  woman.  She  is  down  on  it  like  the  lightning,  quick 
as  she  is  in  her  contracted  circle ;  politeness  guarding  her 
from  a  riposte. 

Mr.  Hepburn  apologized  very  humbly,  after  regaining 
his  chair.  Diana  smiled  and  said  :  "  Incidents  in  a  drawing- 
room  are  prize- shots  at  Dulness." 

'^  And  in  a  dining-room  too,"  added  Sullivan  Smith.  ^^I 
was  one  day  at  a  dinner-party,  apparently  of  undertakers 
hired  to  mourn  over  the  joints  and  the  birds  in  the  dishes, 
when  the  ceiling  came  down,  and  we  all  sprang  up  merry 
as  crickets.  It  led  to  a  pretty  encounter  and  a  real 
prize-shot." 

"  Does  that  signify  a  duel  ?  "  asked  Lady  Pennon. 

"  'T  would  be  the  vulgar  title,  to  bring  it  into  discredit 
with  the  populace,  my  lady." 

"  Rank  me  one  of  the  populace  then !  I  hate  duelling 
and  rejoice  that  it  is  discountenanced." 

"  The  citizens,  and  not  the  populace,  I  think  Mr.  Sullivan 
Smith  means,"  Diana  said.  "  The  citizen  is  generally  right 
in  morals.  My  father  also  was  against  the  practice,  when 
it  raged  at  its  'prettiest.'  I  have  heard  him  relate  a  story 
of  a  poor  friend  of  his,  who  had  to  march  out  for  a  trifle, 
and  said,  as  he  accepted  the  invitation,  '  It 's  all  nonsense  ! ' 
and  walking  to  the  measured  length,  '  It 's  all  nonsense,  you 
know  ! '  and  when  lying  on  the  ground,  at  his  last  gasp,  *  I 
told  you  it  was  all  nonsense ! ' " 

Sullivan  Smith  leaned  over  to  Whitmonby  and  Dacier 
amid  the  ejaculations,  and  whispered:  "A  lady's  way  of 
telling  the  story  !  —  and  excuseable  to  her :  —  she  had  to 


pjf 


THE  SUBJECT  OF  A  PORTRAIT         273 

Jonah  the  adjective.  What  the  poor  fellow  said  was  "... 
he  murmured  the  sixty-pounder  adjective,  as  in  the  belly  of 
the  whale,  to  rightly  emphasize  his  noun. 

Whitmonby  nodded  to  the  superior  relish  imparted  by 
the  vigour  of  masculine  veracity  in  narration.  "  A  story 
for  its  native  sauce  piquante,"  he  saido 

"  Nothing  without  it !  " 

They  had  each  a  dissolving  grain  of  contempt  for  women 
compelled  by  their  delicacy  to  spoil  that  kind  of  story  which 
demands  the  piquant  accompaniment  to  flavour  it  racily  and 
make  it  passable.  For  to  see  insipid  mildness  complacently 
swallowed  as  an  excellent  thing,  knowing  the  rich  smack 
of  savour  proper  to  the  story,  is  your  anecdotal  gentleman's 
annoyance.  But  if  the  anecdote  had  supported  him,  Sulli- 
van Smith  would  have  let  the  expletive  rest. 

Major  Carew  Mahoney  capped  Mrs.  Warwick's  tale  of 
the  unfortunate  duellist  with  another,  that  confessed  the 
practice  absurd,  though  he  approved  of  it ;  and  he  cited 
Lord  Larrian's  opinion :  "  It  keeps  men  braced  to  civil 
conduct." 

^'  I  would  not  differ  with  the  dear  old  lord ;  but  no  !  the 
pistol  is  the  sceptre  of  the  bully,"  said  Diana. 

Mr.  Hepburn,  with  the  widest  of  eyes  on  her  in  perpetu- 
ity, warm!}'-  agreed  ;  and  the  man  was  notorious  among  men 
for  his  contrary  action. 

"  Most  righteously  our  Princess  Egeria  distinguishes  her 
reign  by  prohibiting  it,"  said  Lady  Singleby. 

"And  how,"  Sullivan  Smith  sighed  heavily,  "how,  I'd 
ask,  are  ladies  to  be  protected  from  the  bully  ?  " 

He  was  beset :  "  So  it  was  all  for  us  ?  all  in  consideration 
for  our  benefit  ?  " 

He  mournfully  exclaimed  :  "  Why,  surely  !  " 

"  That  is  the  funeral  apology  of  the  Kod,  at  the  close  of 
every  barbarous  chapter,"  said  Diana. 

"  Too  fine  in  mind,  too  fat  in  body ;  that  is  a  consequence 
with  men,  dear  madam.  The  conqueror  stands  to  his  weap- 
ons, or  he  loses  his  possessions." 

"  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  jumps  at  his  pleasure  from  the 
special  to  the  general,  and  will  be  back,  if  we  follow  him, 
Lady  Pennon.  It  is  the  trick  men  charge  to  women,  show- 
ing that  they  can  resemble  us." 

18 


274  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Lady  Pennon  thumped  her  knee.  "  Not  a  bit.  There  'a 
no  resemblance,  and  they  know  nothing  of  us.'^ 

"Women  are  a  blank  to  them,  I  believe,"  said  Whit- 
monby,  treacherously  bowing;  and  Westlake  said  :  "Traces 
of  a  singular  scrawl  have  been  observed  when  they  were 
held  in  close  proximity  to  the  fire." 

"Once,  on  the  top  of  a  coach,"  Whitmonby  resumed,  "I 
heard  a  comely  dame  of  the  period  when  summers  are  ceas- 
ing threatened  by  her  husband  with  a  divorce,  for  omitting 
to  put  sandwiches  in  their  luncheon-basket.  She  made  him 
the  inscrutable  answer  :  '  Ah,  poor  man !  you  will  go  down 
ignorant  to  your  grave  ! '  We  laughed,  and  to  this  day  I 
cannot  tell  you  why." 

"  That  laugh  was  from  a  basket  lacking  provision ;  —  and 
I  think  we  could  trace  our  separation  to  it,"  Diana  said  to 
Lady  Pennon,  who  replied :  "  They  expose  themselves  ;  they 
get  no  nearer  to  the  riddle." 

Miss  Courtney,  a  rising  young  actress,  encouraged  by  a 
smile  from  Mrs.  Warwick,  remarked ;  "  On  the  stage,  we 
have  each  our  parts  equally." 

"And  speaking  parts;  not  personse  mutse." 

"The  stage  has  advanced  in  verisimilitude,"  Henry  Wil- 
mers  added  slyly ;  and  Diana  rejoined  :  "  You  recognize  a 
verisimilitude  of  the  mirror  when  it  is  in  advance  of  reality. 
Platter  the  sketch.  Miss  Paynham,  for  a  likeness  to  be  seen. 
Probably  there  are  still  Old  Conservatives  who  would  prefer 
the  personation  of  us  by  boys." 

"  I  don't  know,"  Westlake  affected  dubiousness.  "  I  have 
heard  that  a  step  to  the  riddle  is  gained  by  a  serious  con- 
templation of  boys." 

"  Serious  ?  " 

"That  is  the  doubt." 

"  The  doubt  throws  its  light  on  the  step !  " 

"  I  advise  them  not  to  take  any  leap  from  their  step," 
said  Lady  Pennon. 

"It  would  be  a  way  of  learning  that  we  are  no  wiser 
than  our  sires ;  but  perhaps  too  painful  a  way,"  Whitmonby 
observed.  "Poor  Mountford  Wilts  boasted  of  knowing 
women;  and  he  married.  To  jump  into  the  mouth  of  the 
enigma,  is  not  to  read  it." 

"You  are  figures  of  conceit  when  you  speculate  on  us, 
Mr.  Whitmonby." 


THE   SUBJECT    OF   A   PORTRAIT  275 

"An  occupation  of  our  leisure,  my  lady,  for  your 
amusement." 

"  The  leisure  of  the  humming-top,  a  thousand  to  the 
minute,  with  the  pretence  that  it  sleeps  !  '^  Diana  said. 

"  The  sacrilegious  hand  to  strip  you  of  your  mystery  is 
withered  as  it  stretches,"  exclaimed  Westlake.  "  The  sage 
and  the  devout  are  in  accord  for  once." 

"And  whichever  of  the  two  I  may  be,  I  'm  one  of  them, 
happy  to  do  my  homage  blindfold  !  "  Sullivan  Smith  waved 
the  sign  of  it. 

Diana  sent  her  eyes  over  him  and  Mr.  Hepburn,  seeing 
Dacier.  "  That  rosy  medisevalism  seems  the  utmost  we  can 
expect."  An  instant  she  saddened,  foreboding  her  words 
to  be  ominous,  because  of  suddenly  thirsting  for  a  modern 
cry  from  him,  the  silent.  She  quitted  her  woman's  fit  of 
earnestness,  and  took  to  the  humour  that  pleased  him. 
"Aslauga's  knight,  at  his  blind  man's  buff  of  devotion, 
catches  the  hem  of  the  tapestry  and  is  found  by  his  lady 
kissing  it  in  a  trance  of  homage  five  hours  long!  Sir 
Hilary  of  Agincourt,  returned  from  the  wars  to  his  castle 
at  midnight,  hears  that  the  chatelaine  is  away  dancing, 
and  remains  with  all  his  men  mounted  in  the  courtyard 
till  the  grey  morn  brings  her  back !  Adorable !  We  had 
a  flag  flying  in  those  days.  Since  men  began  to  fret  the 
riddle,  they  have  hauled  it  down  half-mast.  Soon  we  shall 
behold  a  bare  pole  and  hats  on  around  it.  That  is  their 
solution." 

A  smile  circled  at  the  hearing  of  Lady  Singleby  say : 
"  Well !  I  am  all  for  our  own  times,  however  literal  the 
men." 

"  We  are  two  different  species  ! "  thumped  Lady  Pennon, 
swimming  on  the  theme.  "I  am  sure,  I  read  what  they 
write  of  women  !     And  their  heroines  !  " 

Lady  Esquart  acquiesced  :  "  We  are  utter  fools  or  horrid 
knaves." 

"  Nature's  original  hieroglyphs  —  which  have  that  appear- 
ance to  the  peruser,"  Westlake  assented. 

"  And  when  they  would  decipher  us,  and  they  hit  on  one 
of  our  ^arts,'  the  literary  pirouette  they  perform  is 
memorable."  Diana  looked  invitingly  at  Dacier.  "But  I 
for  one  discern  a  possible  relationship  and  a  likeness." 


276  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  I  think  it  exists  —  behind  a  curtain,"  Dacier  replied. 

"  Before  the  era  of  the  Nursery.  Liberty  to  grow ; 
independence  is  the  key  of  the  secret." 

"  And  what  comes  after  the  independence  ?  "  he  inquired. 

Whitmonby,  musing  that  some  distraction  of  an  earnest 
incentive  spoilt  Mrs.  Warwick's  wit,  informed  him :  "The 
two  different  species  then  break  their  shallow  armistice  and 
join  the  shock  of  battle  for  possession  of  the  earth,  and  we 
are  outnumbered  and  exterminated,  to  a  certainty.  So  I  am 
against  independence." 

"Socially  a  Mussulman,  subject  to  explosions!"  Diana 
said.  "  So  the  eternal  duel  between  us  is  maintained,  and 
men  will  protest  that  they  are  for  civilization.  Dear  me,  I 
should  like  to  write  a  sketch  of  the  women  of  the  future  — 
don't  be  afraid!  —  the  far  future.  What  a  different  earth 
you  will  see  ! " 

And  very  different  creatures  !  the  gentlemen  unanimously 
surmised.  Westlake  described  the  fairer  portion,  no  longer 
the  weaker ;  frightful  hosts. 

Diana  promised  him  a  sweeter  picture,  if  ever  she  brought 
her  hand  to  paint  it. 

'^  You  would  be  offered  up  to  the  English  national  hang- 
man, Jehoiachim  Sneer,"  interposed  Arthur  Rhodes,  evi- 
dently firing  a  gun  too  big  for  him,  of  premeditated  charging, 
as  his  patroness  perceived;  but  she  knew  him  to  be 
smarting  under  recent  applications  of  the  swish  of  Mr. 
Sneer,  and  that  he  rushed  to  support  her.  She  covered 
him  by  saying  :  "  If  he  has  to  be  encountered,  he  kills  none 
but  the  cripple,"  wherewith  the  dead  pause  ensuing  from  a 
dose  of  outlandish  speech  in  good  company  was  bridged, 
though  the  youth  heard  Westlake  mutter  unpleasantly : 
'Mehoiachim,"  and  had  to  endure  a  stare  of  Dacier's,  who 
did  not  conceal  his  want  of  comprehension  of  the  place  he 
occupied  in  Mrs.  Warwick's  gatherings. 

"  They  know  nothing  of  us  whatever ! "  Lady  Pennon 
harped  on  her  dictum. 

"  They  put  us  in  a  case  and  profoundly  study  the  captive 
creature,"  said  Diana :  "  but  would  any  man  understand 
this  ?  .  .  ."  She  dropped  her  voice  and  drew  in  the  heads 
of  Lady  Pennon,  Lady  Singleby,  Lady  Esquart  and  Miss 
Courtney  :  "  Keal  woman's  nature  speaks.     A  maid  of  mine 


THE   SUBJECT   OP   A  PORTRAIT  277 

had  a  'follower.'  She  was  a  good  girl;  I  was  anxious 
about  her  and  asked  her  if  she  could  trust  him.  ^  Oh,  yes, 
ma'am/  she  replied,  '  I  can ;  he 's  quite  like  a  female.'  I 
longed  to  see  the  young  man,  to  tell  him  he  had  received 
the  highest  of  eulogies." 

The  ladies  appreciatingly  declared  that  such  a  tale  was 
beyond  the  understandings  of  men.  Miss  Paynham  primmed 
her  mouth,  admitting  to  herself  her  inability  to  repeat  such 
a  tale  :  an  act  that  she  deemed  not  "quite  like  a  lady."  She 
had  previously  come  to  the  conclusion  that  Mrs.  Warwick, 
with  all  her  generous  qualities,  was  deficient  in  delicate 
sentiment  —  owing  perhaps  to  her  coldness  of  temperament. 
Like  Dacier  also,  she  failed  to  comprehend  the  patronage 
of  Mr.  Rhodes:  it  led  to  suppositions;  indefinite  truly,  and 
not  calumnious  at  all ;  but  a  young  poet,  rather  good-look- 
ing and  well  built,  is  not  the  same  kind  of  wing-chick  as  a 
young  actress,  like  Miss  Courtney  —  Mrs.  Warwick's  latest 
shieldling :  he  is  hardly  enrolled  for  the  reason  that  was 
assumed  to  sanction  Mrs.  Warwick's  maid  in  the  encourage- 
ment of  her  follower.  Miss  Paynham  sketched  on,  with 
her  thoughts  in  her  bosom :  a  damsel  castigatingly  pursued 
by  the  idea  of  sex  as  the  direct  motive  of  every  act  of  every 
person  surrounding  her;  deductively  therefore  that  a  cer- 
tain form  of  the  impelling  passion,  mild  or  terrible,  or 
capricious,  or  it  might  be  less  pardonable,  was  unceasingly 
at  work  among  the  human  couples  up  to  decrepitude.  And 
she  too  frequently  hit  the  fact  to  doubt  her  gift  of  reading 
into  them.  Mr.  Dacier  was  plain,  and  the  state  of  young  Mr. 
Rhodes ;  and  the  Scottish  gentleman  was  at  least  a  vehe- 
ment admirer.  But  she  penetrated  the  breast  of  Mr. 
Thomas  Redworth  as  well,  mentally  tore  his  mask  of  friend- 
ship to  shreds.  He  was  kind  indeed  in  commissioning  her 
to  do  the  portrait.  His  desire  for  it,  and  his  urgency  to 
have  the  features  exactly  given,  besides  the  infrequency  of 
his  visits  of  late,  when  a  favoured  gentleman  was  present, 
were  the  betraying  signs.  Deductively,  moreover,  the  lady 
who  inspired  the  passion  in  numbers  of  gentlemen  and  set 
herself  to  win  their  admiration  with  her  lively  play  of  dia- 
logue, must  be  coquettish ;  she  could  hold  them  only  by 
coldness.  Anecdotes,  epigrams,  drolleries,  do  not  bubble 
to  the  lips  of  a  woman   who  is  under  an  emotional  spell : 


278  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

rather  they  prove  that  she  has  the  spell  for  casting.  It 
suited  Mr.  Dacier,  Miss  Paynham  thought:  it  was  cruel 
to  Mr.  Redworth ;  at  whom,  of  all  her  circle,  the  beauti- 
ful woman  looked,  when  speaking  to  him,  sometimes 
tenderly. 

"  Beware  the  silent  one  of  an  assembly  !  "  Diana  had 
written.  She  did  not  think  of  her  words  while  Miss  Payn- 
ham continued  mutely  sketching.  The  silent  ones,  with 
much  conversation  around  them,  have  their  heads  at  work, 
critically  perforce ;  the  faster  if  their  hands  are  occupied  ; 
and  the  point  they  lean  to  do  is  the  pivot  of  their  thoughts. 
Miss  Paynham  felt  for  Mr.  Eedworth. 

Diana  was  unaware  of  any  other  critic  present  than  him 
she  sought  to  enliven,  not  unsuccessfully,  notwithstanding 
his  English  objection  to  the  pitch  of  the  converse  she  led, 
and  a  suspicion  of  effort  to  support  it :  —  just  a  doubt,  with 
all  her  easy  voluble  run,  of  the  possibility  of  naturalness  in 
a  continuous  cleverness.  But  he  signified  pleasure,  and  in 
pleasing  him  she  was  hajpy  :  in  the  knowledge  that  she 
dazzled,  was  her  sense  of  safety.  Percy  hated  scandal;  he 
heard  none.  He  wanted  stirring,  cheering;  in  her  house 
he  had  it.  He  came  daily,  and  as  it  was  her  wish  that 
new  themes,  new  flights  of  converse,  should  delight  him 
and  show  her  exhaustless,  to  preserve  her  ascendancy,  she 
welcomed  him  without  consulting  the  world.  He  was 
witness  of  Mr.  Hepburn's  presentation  of  a  costly  China 
vase,  to  repair  the  breach  in  her  array  of  ornaments,  and 
excuse  a  visit.  Judging  by  the  absence  of  any  blow  within, 
he  saw  not  a  sign  of  coquetry.  Some  such  visit  had  been 
anticipated  by  the  prescient  woman,  so  there  was  no  red- 
dening. She  brought  about  an  exchange  of  sentences  be- 
tween him  and  her  furious  admirer,  sparing  either  of  them 
a  glimpse  of  which  was  the  sacrifice  to  the  other,  amusing 
thera  both.  Dacier  could  allow  Mr.  Hepburn  to  outsit 
him ;  and  he  left  them,  proud  of  his  absolute  confidence 
in  her. 

She  was  mistaken  in  imagining  that  her  social  vivacity, 
mixed  with  comradeship  of  the  active  intellect,  was  the 
charm  which  kept  Mr.  Percy  Dacier  temperate  when  he 
well  knew  her  to  distinguish  him  above  her  courtiers.  Her 
powers  of  dazzling  kept  him  tame ;  they  did  not  stamp  her 


THE   SUBJECT   OF  A   PORTRAIT  279 

mark  on  him.  He  was  one  of  the  order  of  highly  polished 
men,  ignorant  of  women,  who  are  impressed  for  long  terms 
by  temporary  flashes,  that  hold  them  bound  until  a  fresh 
impression  comes,  to  confirm  or  obliterate  the  preceding. 
Affairs  of  the  world  he  could  treat  competently ;  he  had  a 
head  for  high  politics  and  the  management  of  men  ;  the 
feminine  half  of  the  world  was  a  confusion  and  a  vexation 
to  his  intelligence,  characterless;  and  one  woman  at  last 
appearing  decipherable,  he  fancied  it  must  be  owing  to  her 
possession  of  character,  a  thing  prized  the  more  in  women 
because  of  his  latent  doubt  of  its  existence.  Character,  that 
was  the  mark  he  aimed  at ;  that  moved  him  to  homage  as 
neither  sparkling  wit  nor  incomparable  beauty,  nor  the  un- 
usual combination,  did.  To  be  distinguished  by  a  woman 
of  character  (beauty  and  wit  for  jewellery),  was  his  minor 
ambition  in  life,  and  if  Fortune  now  gratified  it,  he  owned 
to  the  flattery.  It  really  seemed  by  every  test  that  she  had 
the  quality.  Since  the  day  when  he  beheld  her  by  the  bed- 
side of  his  dead  uncle,  and  that  one  on  the  French  sea-sands, 
and  again  at  Copsley,  ghostly  white  out  of  her  wrestle  with 
death,  bleeding  holy  sweat  of  brow  for  her  friend,  the  print 
of  her  features  had  been  on  him  as  an  index  of  depth  of 
character,  imposing  respect  and  admiration  —  a  sentiment 
imperilled  by  her  consent  to  fly  with  him.  Her  subsequent 
reserve  until  they  met  —  by  an  accident  that  the  lady  at 
any  rate  was  not  responsible  for,  proved  the  quality  posi- 
tively. And  the  nature  of  her  character,  at  first  suspected, 
vanquished  him  more,  by  comparison,  than  her  vivid  intel- 
lect, which  he  originally,  and  still  lingeringly,  appreciated 
in  condescension,  as  a  singular  accomplishment,  thrilling  at 
times,  now  and  then  assailably  feminine.  But,  after  her 
consent  to  a  proposal  that  caused  him  retrospective  worldly 
shudders,  and  her  composed  recognition  of  the  madness,  a 
character  capable  of  holding  him  in  some  awe  was  real 
majesty,  and  it  rose  to  the  clear  heights,  with  her  mental 
attributes  for  satellites.  His  tendency  to  despise  women 
was  wholesomely  checked  by  the  experience  to  justify  him 
in  saying.  Here  is  a  worthy  one  !  She  was  health  to  him, 
as  well  as  trusty  counsel.  Furthermore,  where  he  respected, 
he  was  a  governed  man,  free  of  the  common  masculine  craze 
to  scale  fortresses  for  the  sake  of  lowering  flags.     Whilst 


280  DIANA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

under  his  impression  of  her  character,  he  submitted  honour- 
ably to  the  ascendancy  of  a  lady  whose  conduct  suited  him 
and  whose  preference  flattered;  whose  presence  was  very 
refreshing;  whose  letters  were  a  stimulant.  Her  letters 
were  really  running  well-waters,  not  a  lover's  delusion  of 
the  luminous  mind  of  his  lady.  They  sparkled  in  review 
and  preserved  their  integrity  under  critical  analysis.  The 
reading  of  them  hurried  him  in  pursuit  of  her  from  house 
to  house  during  the  autumn ;  and  as  she  did  not  hint  at  the 
shadow  his  coming  cast  on  her,  his  conscience  was  easy. 
Regarding  their  future,  his  political  anxieties  were  a  moun- 
tainous defile,  curtaining  the  outlook.  They  met  at  Lockton, 
where  he  arrived  after  a  recent  consultation  with  his  Chief, 
of  whom,  and  the  murmurs  of  the  Cabinet,  he  spoke  to 
Diana  openly,  in  some  dejection. 

"  They  might  see  he  has  been  breaking  with  his  party  for 
the  last  four  years,"  she  said.  "  The  plunge  to  be  taken  is 
tremendous." 

^^  But  will  he?    He  appears  too  despondent  for  a  header." 

"We  cannot  dance  on  a  quaking  floor." 

"  No ;  it 's  exactly  that  quake  of  the  floor  which  gives 
*  much  qualms,'  to  me  as  well,"  said  Dacier. 

"A  treble  Neptune's  power!"  she  rejoined,  for  his 
particular  delectation.  "  Enough  if  he  hesitates.  I  forgive 
him  his  nausea.  He  awaits  the  impetus,  and  it  will  reach 
him,  and  soon.  He  will  not  wait  for  the  mob  at  his  heels, 
I  am  certain.  A  Minister  who  does  that,  is  a  post,  and  goes 
down  with  the  first  bursting  of  the  dam.  He  has  tried  com- 
promise and  discovered  that  it  does  not  appease  the  Fates  ; 
is  not  even  a  makeshift-mending  at  this  hour.  He  is  a  man 
of  nerves,  very  sensitively  built ;  as  quick  —  quicker  than  a 
woman,  I  could  almost  say,  to  feel  the  tremble  of  the  air  — 
forerunner  of  imperative  changes." 

Dacier  brightened  fondly.  "  You  positively  describe  him; 
paint  him  to  the  life,  without  knowing  him  !  " 

"  I  have  seen  him  ;  and  if  I  paint,  whose  are  the  colours  ?  " 

"  Sometimes  I  repeat  you  to  him,  and  I  get  all  the  credit," 
said  Dacier. 

"  I  glow  with  pride  to  think  of  speaking  anything  that 
you  repeat,"  said  Diana,  and  her  eyes  were  proudly  lustreful. 

Their   love  was   nourished   on  these   mutual   flatteries. 


THE  POLITICAL  AND  THE  DOMESTIC   CRISIS       281 

Thin  food  for  passion !  The  innocence  of  it  sanctioned  the 
meetings  and  the  appointments  to  meet.  When  separated 
they  were  interchanging  letters,  formally  worded  in  the 
apostrophe  and  the  termination,  but  throbbingly  full :  or 
Diana  thought  so  of  Percy's  letters,  with  grateful  justice; 
for  his  manner  of  opening  his  heart  in  amatory  correspond- 
ence was  to  confide  important  secret  matters,  up  to  which 
mark  she  sprang  to  reply  in  counsel.  He  proved  his  affec- 
tion by  trusting  her ;  his  respect  by  his  tempered  style  :  — 
"A  Greenland  style  of  writing,"  she  had  said  of  an  unhappy 
gentleman's  epistolary  compositions  resembling  it ;  and  now 
the  same  official  baldness  was  to  her  mind  Italianly  rich ;  it 
called  forth  such  volumes. 

Flatteries  that  were  thin  food  for  passion  appeared  the 
simplest  exchanges  of  courtesy,  and  her  meetings  with  her 
lover,  judging  by  the  nature  of  the  discourse  they  held,  so 
consequent  to  their  joint  interest  in  the  great  crisis  antici- 
pated, as  to  rouse  her  indignant  surprise  and  a  turn  for 
downright  rebellion  when  the  Argus  world  signified  the  fact 
of  its  having  one  eye,  or  more,  wide  open. 

Debit  and  Credit,  too,  her  buzzing  familiars,  insisted  on 
an  audience  at  each  ear,  and  at  the  house-door,  on  her  return 
to  London. 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

SHOWS   THE   APPROACHES    OF    THE    POLITICAL    AND    THE 
DOMESTIC    CRISIS    IN    COMPANY 

There  was  not  much  talk  of  Diana  between  Lady  Dunstane 
and  her  customary  visitor  Tom  Redworth  now.  She  was 
shy  in  speaking  of  the  love-stricken  woman,  and  more  was 
in  his  mind  for  thought  than  for  speech.  She  sometimes 
wondered  how  much  he  might  know,  ending  with  the  re- 
flection that  little  passing  around  was  unknown  to  him. 
He  had  to  shut  his  mind  against  thought,  against  all  medi- 
tation upon  Mrs.  Warwick;  it  was  based  scientifically  when 
speculating  and  calculating,  on  the  material  element  —  a 
talisman.     Men  and  women  crossing  the  high  seas  of  life 


282  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

he  had  found  most  readable  under  that  illuminating  in- 
quiry, as  to  their  means.  An  inspector  of  seaworthy  ships 
proceeds  in  like  manner.  Whence  would  the  money  come  ? 
He  could  not  help  the  bent  of  his  mind  ;  but  he  could  avoid 
subjecting  her  to  the  talismanic  touch.  The  girl  at  the 
Dublin  Ball,  the  woman  at  the  fire-grate  of  The  Crossways, 
both  in  one  were  his  Diana.  Now  and  then,  hearing  an 
ugly  whisper,  his  manful  sympathy  with  the  mere  woman 
in  her  imprisoned  liberty,  defended  her  desperately  from 
charges  not  distinctly  formulated  within  him:  —  "She's 
not  made  of  stone."  That  was  a  height  of  self-abnegation 
to  shake  the  poor  fellow  to  his  roots ;  but,  then,  he  had 
no  hopes  of  his  own  ;  and  he  stuck  to  it.  Her  choice  of 
a  man  like  Dacier,  too,  of  whom  Redworth  judged  highly, 
showed  nobility.  She  irradiated  the  man  ;  but  no  base- 
ness could  be  in  such  an  alliance.  If  allied,  they  were 
bound  together  for  good.  The  tie  —  supposing  a  villain 
world  not  wrong  —  was  only  not  the  sacred  tie  because  of 
impediments.  The  tie  !  —  he  deliberated,  and  said  stoutly 
No.  Men  of  Eedworth's  nature  go  through  sharp  con- 
tests, though  the  duration  of  them  is  short,  and  the  tussle 
of  his  worship  of  this  woman  with  the  materialistic  turn 
of  his  mind  was  closed  by  the  complete  shutting  up  of 
the  latter  under  lock  and  bar ;  so  that  a  man,  very  little 
of  an  idealist,  was  able  to  sustain  her  in  the  pure  im- 
agination —  where  she  did  almost  belong  to  him.  She 
was  his,  in  a  sense,  because  she  might  have  been  his  —  but 
for  an  incredible  extreme  of  folly.  The  dark  riiig  of  the 
eclipse  cast  by  some  amazing  foolishness  round  the  shining 
crescent  perpetually  in  secret  claimed  the  whole  sphere  of 
her,  by  what  might  have  been,  while  admitting  her  lost  to 
him  in  fact.  To  Thomas  Redworth's  mind  the  lack  of  per- 
fect sanity  in  his  conduct  at  any  period  of  manhood,  was  so 
entirely  past  belief  that  he  flew  at  the  circumstances  con- 
firming the  charge,  and  had  wrestles  with  the  angel  of 
reality,  who  did  but  set  him  dreaming  backward,  after 
flinging  him. 

He  heard  at  Lady  Wathin's  that  Mrs.  Warwick  was  in 
town  for  the  winter.  "  Mr.  Dacier  is  also  in  town,"  Lady 
Wathin  said,  with  an  acid  indication  of  the  needless  men- 
tion of  it.     "We  have  not  seen  him."     She  invited  Red- 


THE  POLITICAL   AND  THE  DOMESTIC   CRISIS       283 

worth  to  meet  a  few  friends  at  dinner.  "  I  think  you 
admire  Miss  Asper  :  in  my  idea  a  very  samt  among  young 
women ;  and  you  know  what  the  young  women  of  our  day 
are.  She  will  be  present.  She  is,  you  are  aware,  Eng- 
land's greatest  heiress.  Only  yesterday,  hearing  of  that 
poor  man  Mr.  Warwick's  desperate  attack  of  illness  — 
heart ! — and  of  his  having  no  relative  or  friend  to  soothe 
his  pillow,  —  he  is  lying  in  absolute  loneliness,  —  she  offered 
to  go  and  nurse  him !  Of  course  it  could  not  be  done.  It 
is  not  her  place.  The  beauty  of  the  character  of  a  dear 
innocent  young  girl,  with  every  gratification  at  command, 
who  could  make  the  offer,  strikes  me  as  unparalleled.  She 
was  perfectly  sincere  —  she  is  sincerity.  She  asked  at 
once,  Where  is  he  ?  She  wished  me  to  accompany  her 
on  a  first  visit.     I  saw  a  tear." 

Red  worth  had  called  at  Lady  Wathin's  for  information 
of  the  state  of  Mr.  Warwick,  concerning  which  a  rumour 
was  abroad.  No  stranger  to  the  vagrant  compassionate- 
ness  of  sentimentalists; — rich,  idle,  conscience-pricked  or 
praise-catching ;  —  he  was  unmoved  by  the  tale  that  Miss 
Asper  had  proposed  to  go  to  Mr.  Warwick's  sick-bed  in  the 
uniform  of  a  Sister  of  Charity  :  —  "  Speaking  French  !  " 
Lady  Wathin  exclaimed  ;  and  his  head  rocked,  as  he  said : 
"  An  Englishman  would  not  be  likely  to  know  better." 

"She  speaks  exquisite  French  —  all  European  languages, 
Mr.  Redworth.  She  does  not  pretend  to  wit.  To  my  think- 
ing, depth  of  sentiment  is  a  far  more  feminine  accomplish- 
ment.    It  assuredly  will  be  found  a  greater  treasure." 

The  modest  man  (modest  in  such  matters)  was  led  by 
degrees  to  fancy  himself  sounded  regarding  Miss  Asper : 
a  piece  of  sculpture  glacially  decorative  of  the  domestic 
mansion  in  person,  to  his  thinking ;  and  as  to  the  nature  of 
it  —  not  a  Diana,  with  all  her  faults  ! 

If  Diana  had  any  faults,  in  a  world  and  a  position  so 
heavily  against  her !  He  laughed  to  himself,  when  alone, 
at  the  neatly  implied  bitter  reproach  cast  on  the  wife  by 
the  forsaken  young  lady,  who  proposed  to  nurse  the  aban- 
doned husband  of  the  woman  bereaving  her  of  the  man  she 
loved.  Sentimentalists  enjoy  these  tricks,  the  conceiving 
or  the  doing  of  them  —  the  former  mainly,  which  are 
cheaper,  and  equally  effective.     Miss  Asper  might  be  defi- 


284  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

cient  in  wit ;  this  was  a  form  of  practical  wit,  occasionally 
exhibited  by  creatures  acting  on  their  instincts.  Warwick 
he  pitied,  and  he  put  compulsion  on  himself  to  go  and  see 
the  poor  fellow,  the  subject  of  so  sublime  a  generosity. 
Mr.  Warwick  sat  in  an  arm-chair,  his  legs  out  straight  on 
the  heels,  his  jaw  dragging  hollow  cheeks,  his  hands  loosely 
joined ;  improving  in  health,  he  said.  A  demure  woman 
of  middle  age  was  in  attendance.  He  did  not  speak  of  his 
wife.  Three  times  he  said  disconnectedly,  "  I  hear  reports,'' 
and  his  eyelids  worked.  Redworth  talked  of  general 
affairs,  without  those  consolatory  efforts,  useless  between 
men,  which  are  neither  medicine  nor  good  honest  water: 
—  he  judged  by  personal  feelings.  In  consequence,  he  left 
an  invalid  the  sourer  for  his  visit. 

Next  day  he  received  a  briefly-worded  summons  from  Mrs. 
Warwick. 

Crossing  the  park  on  the  line  to  Diana's  house,  he  met 
Miss  Paynham,  who  grieved  to  say  that  Mrs.  Warwick 
could  not  give  her  a  sitting ;  and  in  a  still  mournfuller  tone, 
imagined  he  would  find  her  at  home,  and  alone  by  this 
time.     "  I  left  no  one  but  Mr.  Dacier  there,"  she  observed. 

"  Mrs.  Warwick  will  be  disengaged  to-morrow,  no  doubt," 
he  said  consolingly. 

Her  head  performed  the  negative.  "  They  talk  politics, 
and  she  becomes  animated,  loses  her  pose.  I  will  per- 
severe, though  I  fear  I  have  undertaken  a  task  too  much 
for  me." 

"I  am  deeply  indebted  to  you  for  the  attempt."  Red- 
worth  bowed  to  her  and  set  his  face  to  the  Abbey-towers, 
which  wore  a  different  aspect  in  the  smoked  grey  light 
since  his  two  minutes  of  colloquy.  He  had  previously 
noticed  that  meetings  with  Miss  Paynham  produced  a 
similar  effect  on  him,  a  not  so  very  impressionable  man. 
And  how  was  it  done  ?  She  told  him  nothing  he  did  not 
know  or  guess. 

Diana  was  alone.  Her  manner,  after  the  greeting, 
seemed  feverish.  She  had  not  to  excuse  herself  for  abrupt- 
ness when  he  heard  the  nature  of  the  subject.  Her  coun- 
sellor and  friend  was  informed,  in  feminine  style,  that  she 
had  requested  him  to  call,  for  the  purpose  of  consulting 
him  with  regard  to  a  matter  she  had  decided  upon  j  and  it 


THE  POLITICAL  AND  THE  DOMESTIC   CRISIS       285 

was,  the  sale  of  The  Crossways.  She  said  that  it  would 
have  gone  to  her  heart  once ;  she  supposed  she  had  lost 
her  affection  for  the  place,  or  had  got  the  better  of  her 
superstitions.  She  spoke  lamely  as  well  as  bluntly.  The 
place  was  hers,  she  said ;  her  own  property.  Her  husband 
could  not  interdict  a  sale. 

Eedworth  addressed  himself  to  her  smothered  antago- 
nism. "  Even  if  he  had  rights,  as  they  are  termed  ...  I 
think  you  might  count  on  their  not  being  pressed." 

"  I  have  been  told  of  illness."  She  tapped  her  foot  on 
the  floor. 

"  His  present  state  of  health  is  unequal  to  his  ordinary 
duties." 

"Emma  Dunstane  is  fully  supplied  with  the  latest  in- 
telligence, Mr.  Red  worth.     You  know  the  source." 

"  I  mention  it  simply  ..." 

"  Yes,  yes.  What  I  have  to  protest  is,  that  in  this 
respect  I  am  free.  The  Law  has  me  fast,  but  leaves  me 
its  legal  view  of  my  small  property.  I  have  no  authority 
over  me.  I  can  do  as  I  please  in  this,  without  a  collision, 
or  the  dread  of  one.  It  is  the  married  woman's  perpetual 
dread  when  she  ventures  a  step.  Your  Law  originally 
presumed  her  a  China-footed  animal.  And  more,  I  have  a 
claim  for  maintenance." 

She  crimsoned  angrily. 

Redworth  showed  a  look  of  pleasure,  hard  to  understand. 
"  The  application  would  be  sufficient,  I  fancy,"  he  said. 

"  It  should  have  been  offered." 

"  Did  you  not  decline  it  ?  " 

"  I  declined  to  apply  for  it.  I  thought  —  But,  Mr. 
Redworth,  another  thing,  concerning  us  all :  I  want  very 
much  to  hear  your  ideas  of  the  prospects  of  the  League  ;  be- 
cause I  know  you  have  ideas.  The  leaders  are  terrible  men  ; 
they  fascinate  me.  They  appear  to  move  with  an  army 
of  facts.  They  are  certainly  carrying  the  country.  I  am 
obliged  to  think  them  sincere.  Common  agitators  would 
not  hold  together,  as  they  do.  They  gather  strength  each 
year.  If  their  statistics  are  not  illusory — an  army  of 
phantoms  instead  of  one  of  facts  ;  —  and  they  knock  at  my 
head  without  admission,  I  have  to  confess;  —  they  must 
win." 


286  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  Ultimately,  it  is  quite  calculable  that  they  will  win," 
said  Redworth  ;  and  he  was  led  to  discourse  of  rates  and 
duties  and  prohibitive  tariffs  to  a  woman  surprisingly  athirst, 
curious  for  every  scrap  of  intelligence  relating  to  the  power, 
organization,  and  schemes  of  the  League.  "  Common  sense 
is  the  secret  of  every  successful  civil  agitation,"  he  said. 
"  E-ap  it  unremittingly  on  crowds  of  the  thickest  of  human 
heads,  and  the  response  comes  at  last  to  sweep  all  before  it. 
You  may  reckon  that  the  country  will  beat  the  landlords  — 
for  that  is  our  question.     Is  it  one  of  your  political  themes  ?  " 

"  I  am  not  presumptuous  to  such  a  degree :  —  a  poor 
scholar,"  Diana  replied.  "  Women  striving  to  lift  their 
heads  among  men  deserve  the  sarcasm." 

He  denied  that  any  sarcasm  was  intended,  and  the  lesson 
continued.  When  she  had  shaped  in  her  mind  some  por- 
tion of  his  knowledge  of  the  subject,  she  reverted  casually 
to  her  practical  business.  Would  he  undertake  to  try  to 
obtain  a  purchaser  of  The  Crossways,  at  the  price  he  might 
deem  reasonable  ?  She  left  the  price  entirely  to  his  judge- 
ment. And  now  she  had  determined  to  part  with  the  old 
place,  the  sooner  the  better !  She  said  that  smiling ;  and 
Kedworth  smiled,  outwardly  and  inwardly.  Her  talk  of 
her  affairs  was  clearer  to  him  than  her  curiosity  for  the 
mysteries  of  the  League.  He  gained  kind  looks  besides 
warm  thanks  by  the  promise  to  seek  a  purchaser ;  especially 
by  his  avoidance  of  prying  queries.  She  wanted  just  this 
excellent  automaton  fac-totum  ;  and  she  referred  him  to 
Mr.  Braddock  for  the  title-deeds  et  caetera  —  the  chirping 
phrase  of  ladies  happily  washing  their  hands  of  the  mean 
details  of  business. 

"  How  of  your  last  work  ?  "  he  asked  her. 

Serenest  equanimity  rejoined  :  "  As  I  anticipated,  it  is  not 
popular.  The  critics  are  of  one  mind  with  the  public.  You 
niay  have  noticed,  they  rarely  flower  above  that  rocky  sur- 
face. The  Cantatrice  sings  them  a  false  note.  My  next 
will  probably  please  them  less." 

Her  mobile  lips  and  brows  shot  the  faint  upper-wreath  of 
a  smile  hovering.    It  was  designed  to  display  her  philosophy. 

"  And  what  is  the  name  of  your  next  ?  "  said  he. 

"  I  name  it  The  Man  of  Two  Minds,  if  you  can  allow 
that  to  be  in  nature." 


THE  POLITICAL  AND   THE  DOMESTIC   CRISIS       287 

<^  Contra-distinguished  from  the  woman  ?" 

"  Oh  !  you  must  first  believe  the  woman  to  have  one." 

^'  You  are  working  on  it  ?  " 

"  By  fits.  And  I  forgot,  Mr.  Eedworth :  I  have  mislaid 
my  receipts,  and  must  ask  you  for  the  address  of  your  wine- 
merchant  ;  —  or,  will  you  ?  Several  dozen  of  the  same  wines. 
I  can  trust  him  to  be  in  awe  of  you,  and  the  good  repute  of 
my  table  depends  on  his  honesty." 

Redworth  took  the  definite  order  for  a  large  supply  of 

wine. 

She  gave  him  her  hand  :  a  lost  hand,  dear  to  hold,  need- 
ing to  be  guided,  he  feared.  For  him,  it  was  merely  a  hand, 
cut  off  from  the  wrist ;  and  he  had  performed  that  executive 
part !  A  wiser  man  would  now  have  been  the  lord  of 
it.  ...  So  he  felt,  with  his  burning  wish  to  protect  and 
cherish  the  beloved  woman,  while  saying :  "  If  we  find  a 
speedy  bidder  for  The  Crossways,  you  will  have  to  thank 
our  railways." 

"  You  !  "  said  Diana,  confident  in  his  ability  to  do  every- 
thing of  the  practical  kind. 

Her  ingenuousness  tickled  him.  He  missed  her  comic 
touches  upon  men  and  things,  but  the  fever  shown  by  her 
manner  accounted  for  it. 

As  soon  as  he  left  her,  she  was  writing  to  the  lover  who 
had  an  hour  previously  been  hearing  her  voice ;  the  note  of 
her  theme  being  Party ;  and  how  to  serve  it,  when  to  sacri- 
fice it  to  the  Country.  She  wrote,  carolling  bars  of  the  Puri- 
tani  marches ;  and  such  will  passion  do,  that  her  choice  of 
music  was  quite  in  harmony  with  her  theme.  The  mar- 
tially-amorous melodies  of  Italian  Opera  in  those  days 
fostered  a  passion  challenged  to  intrepidity  from  the  heart 
of  softness;  gilding  at  the  same  time,  and  putting  warm 
blood  even  into  dull  arithmetical  figures  which  might  be 
important  to  her  lover,  her  hero  fronting  battle.  She  con- 
densed Redworth's  information  skilfully,  heartily  giving  it 
and  whatever  she  had  imbibed,  as  her  own,  down  to  the 
remark  :  "  Common  sense  in  questions  of  justice,  is  a  weapon 
that  makes  way  into  human  heads  and  wins  the  certain 
majority,  if  we  strike  with  it  incessantly."  Whether  any- 
thing she  wrote  was  her  own,  mattered  little  :  the  savour  of 
Percys  praise,  which  none  could  share  with  her,  made  it 


288  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

instantly  all  her  own.  Besides  she  wrote  to  strengthen  him ; 
she  naturally  laid  her  friends  and  the  world  under  contri- 
bution ;  and  no  other  sort  of  writing  was  possible.  Percy 
had  not  a  common  interest  in  fiction  ;  still  less  for  high 
comedy.  He  liked  the  broad  laugh  when  he  deigned  to 
open  books  of  that  sort ;  puns  and  strong  flavours  and  har- 
lequin surprises  ;  and  her  work  would  not  admit  of  them, 
however  great  her  willingness  to  force  her  hand  for  his 
amusement :  consequently  her  inventiveness  deadened.  She 
had  to  cease  whipping  it.  "  My  poor  old  London  cabhorse 
of  a  pen  shall  go  to  grass  ! "  she  sighed,  looking  to  the  sale 
of  The  Crossways  for  money ;  looking  no  farther. 

Those  marshalled  battalions  of  Debit  and  Credit  were  in 
hostile  order,  the  weaker  simply  devoted  to  fighting  for 
delay,  when  a  winged  messenger  bearing  the  form  of  old 
Mr.  Braddock  descended  to  her  with  the  reconciling  news 
that  a  hermit  bachelor,  an  acquaintance  of  Mr.  Eedworth's 
—  both  of  whom  wore  a  gloomy  hue  in  her  mind  immedi- 
ately —  had  offered  a  sum  for  the  purchase  of  The  Cross- 
ways.  Considering  the  out-of-the-way  district,  Mr.  Braddock 
thought  it  an  excellent  price  to  get.  She  thought  the  re- 
verse, but  confessed  that  double  the  sum  would  not  have 
altered  her  opinion.  Double  the  sum  scarcely  counted  for 
the  service  she  required  of  it  for  much  more  than  a  year. 
The  money  was  paid  shortly  after  into  her  Bank,  and  then 
she  enjoyed  the  contemptuous  felicity  of  tossing  meat  to  her 
lions,  tigers,  wolves,  and  jackals,  who,  but  for  the  fortunate 
intervention,  would  have  been  feeding  on  her.  These  me- 
nagerie beasts  of  prey  were  the  lady's  tradesmen,  Debit's 
hungry  brood.  She  had  a  rapid  glimpse  of  a  false  position 
in  regarding  that  legitimate  band  so  scornfully :  another 
glimpse  likewise  of  a  day  to  come  when  they  might  not  be 
stopped  at  the  door.  She  was  running  a  race  with  some- 
thing ;  —  with  what  ?    It  was  unnamed ;  it  ran  in  a  shroud. 

At  times  she  surprised  her  heart  violently  beating  when 
there  had  not  been  a  thought  to  set  it  in  motion.  She  traced 
it  once  to  the  words  "  next  year,"  incidentally  mentioned. 
"Free,"  was  a  word  that  checked  her  throbs,  as  at  a  ques- 
tion of  life  or  death.  Her  solitude,  excepting  the  hours  of 
sleep,  if  then,  was  a  time  of  irregular  breathing.  The  some- 
thing  unnamed,   running   beside   her,   became   a  dreadful 


THE  POLITICAL   AND   THE  DOMESTIC   CRISIS       289 

familiar;  the  race  between  them  past  contemplation  for 
ghastliness.  "But  this  is  your  Law!"  she  cried  to  the 
world,  while  blinding  her  eyes  against  a  peep  of  the  shrouded 
features. 

Singularly,  she  had  but  to  abandon  hope,  and  the  shadowy 
figure  vanished,  the  tragic  race  was  ended.  How  to  live 
and  think,  and  not  to  hope :  the  slave  of  passion  had  this 
problem  before  her. 

Other  tasks  were  supportable,  though  one  seemed  hard 
at  moments  and  was  not  passive;  it  attacked  her.  The 
men  and  women  of  her  circle  derisively,  unanimously,  dis- 
believed in  an  innocence  that  forfeited  reputation.  Women 
were  complimentarily  assumed  to  be  not  such  gaping  idiots. 
And  as  the  weeks  advanced,  a  change  came  over  Percy. 
The  gentleman  had  grown  restless  at  covert  congratulations, 
hollow  to  his  knowledge,  however  much  caressing  vanity, 
and  therefore  secretly  a  wound  to  it.  One  day,  after  sitting 
silent,  he  bluntly  proposed  to  break  "this  foolish  trifling;" 
just  in  his  old  manner,  though  not  so  honourably  ;  not  very 
definitely  either.     Her  hand  was  taken. 

"  I  feared  that  dumbness  !  "  Diana  said,  letting  her  hand 
go,  but  keeping  her  composure.  "  My  friend  Percy,  I  am 
not  a  lion-tamer,  and  if  you  are  of  those  animals,  we  break 
the  chapter.  Plainly  you  think  that  where  there  appears 
to  be  a  choice  of  fools,  the  woman  is  distinctly  designed  for 
the  person.  Drop  my  hand,  or  I  shall  repeat  the  fable  of 
the  Goose  with  the  Golden  Eggs." 

"  Fables  are  applicable  only  in  the  school-room,"  said  he ; 
and  he  ventured  on  "  Tony !  " 

"  I  vowed  an  oath  to  my  dear  Emma  —  as  good  as  to  the 
heavens !  and  that  of  itself  would  stay  me  from  being  in- 
sane again."  She  released  herself.  "  Signor  Percy,  you 
teach  me  to  suspect  you  of  having  an  idle  wish  to  pluck 
your  plaything  to  pieces  :  —  to  boast  of  it  ?  Ah  !  ray  friend, 
I  fancied  I  was  of  more  value  to  you.  You  must  come  less 
often ;  even  to  not  at  all,  if  you  are  one  of  those  idols  with 
feet  of  clay  which  leave  the  print  of  their  steps  in  a  room ; 
or  fall  and  crush  the  silly  idolizer." 

"  But  surely  you  know  ..."  said  he.  "  We  can't  have 
to  wait  long."     He  looked  full  of  hopeful  meanings. 

"  A  reason ! "  .  .  .  She  kept  down  her  breath,     A  long 

19 


290  DIANA  OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

drawn  sigh  followed,  through  parted  lips.  She  had  a  sen- 
sation of  horror.  "  And  I  cannot  propose  to  nurse  him  — 
Emma  will  not  hear  of  it,"  she  said.  "  I  dare  not.  Hypo- 
crite to  that  extreme  ?  Oh,  no!  But  I  must  hear  nothing. 
As  it  is,  I  am  haunted.  Now  let  this  pass.  Tony  me  no 
Tonies ;  I  am  atony  to  such  whimpering  business  now  we 
are  in  the  van  of  the  struggle.  All  round  us  it  sounds  like 
war.  Last  night  I  had  Mr.  Tonans  dining  here ;  he  wished 
to  meet  you ;  and  you  must  have  a  private  meeting  with 
Mr.  Whitmonby :  he  will  be  useful ;  others  as  well.  You 
are  wrong  in  affecting  contempt  of  the  Press.  It  perches 
you  on  a  rock;  but  the  swimmer  in  politics  knows  what 
draws  the  tides.  Your  own  people,  your  set,  your  class, 
are  a  drag  to  you,  like  inherited  superstitions  to  the  waken- 
ing brain.  The  greater  the  glory !  For  you  see  the  lead 
you  take  ?  You  are  saving  your  class.  They  should  lead, 
and  will,  if  they  prove  worthy  in  the  crisis.  Their  curi- 
ous error  is  to  believe  in  the  stability  of  a  monumental 
position." 

"  Perfectly  true  ! "  cried  Dacier ;  and  the  next  minute, 
heated  by  approbation,  was  begging  for  her  hand  earnestly. 
She  refused  it. 

"  But  you  say  things  that  catch  me !  "  he  pleaded.  "  Ee- 
member,  it  was  nearly  mine.  It  soon  will  be  mine.  I  heard 
yesterday  from  Lady  Wathin  .  .  .  well,  if  it  pains  you ! " 

"  Speak  on,"  said  Diana,  resigned  to  her  thirsty  ears. 

"  He  is  not  expected  to  last  through  the  autumn." 

"  The  calculation  is  hers  ?  " 

^'  Not  exactly :  —  judging  from  the  symptoms." 

Diana  flashed  a  fiery  eye  into  Dacier's,  and  rose.  She 
was  past  danger  of  melting,  with  her  imagination  darkened 
by  the  funeral  image ;  but  she  craved  solitude,  and  had  to 
act  the  callous,  to  dismiss  him. 

'^Good.  Enough  for  the  day.  Now  leave  me,  if  you 
please.  When  we  meet  again,  stifle  that  raven's  croak.  I 
am  not  a  '  Sister  of  Charity,'  but  neither  am  I  a  vulture 
hovering  for  the  horse  in  the  desert  to  die.  A  poor  sim- 
ile !  — when  it  is  my  own  and  not  another's  breath  that  I 
want.  Nothing  in  nature,  only  gruesome  German  stories 
will  fetch  comparisons  for  the  yoke  of  this  Law  of  yours. 
It  seems  the  nightmare  dream  following  an  ogre's  supper." 


THE  POLITICAL  AND   THE  DOMESTIC   CRISIS       291 

She  was  not  acting  the  shiver  of  her  frame. 

To-morrow  was  open  to  him,  and  prospect  of  better  for- 
tune, so  he  departed,  after  squeezing  the  hand  she  cere- 
moniously extended. 

But  her  woman's  intuition  warned  her  that  she  had  not 
maintained  the  sovereign  impression  which  was  her  secur- 
ity. And  hope  had  become  a  flame  in  her  bosom  that  would 
no  longer  take  the  common  extinguisher.  The  race  she 
ran  was  with  a  shrouded  figure  no  more,  but  with  the  figure 
of  the  shroud  ;  she  had  to  summon  paroxysms  of  a  pity 
hard  to  feel,  images  of  sickness,  helplessness,  the  vaults, 
the  last  human  silence  —  for  the  stilling  of  her  passionate 
heart.  And  when  this  was  partly  effected,  the  question. 
Am  I  going  to  live  ?  renewed  her  tragical  struggle.  Who 
was  it  under  the  vaults,  in  the  shroud,  between  the  planks  ? 
and  with  human  sensibility  to  swell  the  horror !  Passion 
whispered  of  a  vaster  sorrow  needed  for  herself;  and  the 
hope  conjuring  those  frightful  complexities  was  needed  to 
soothe  her.  She  pitied  the  man,  but  she  was  an  enamoured 
woman.  Often  of  late  she  had  been  sharply  stung,  relaxed 
as  well,  by  the  observations  of  Danvers  assisting  at  her 
toilette.  Had  she  beauty  and  charm,  beauty  and  rich  health 
in  the  young  summer  blooming  of  her  days?  —  and  all 
doomed  to  waste  ?  No  insurgency  of  words  arose  in  denun- 
ciation of  the  wrong  done  to  her  nature.  An  undefined 
heavy  feeling  of  wrong  there  was,  just  perceptive  enough 
to  let  her  know,  without  gravely  shaming,  that  one  or  an- 
other must  be  slain  for  peace  to  come ;  for  it  is  the  case  in 
which  the  world  of  the  Laws  overloading  her  is  pitiless  to 
women,  deaf  past  ear-trumpets,  past  intercession  ;  detesting 
and  reviling  them  for  a  feeble  human  cry,  and  for  one  ap- 
parent step  of  revolt  piling  the  pelted  stones  on  them.  It 
will  not  discriminate  shades  of  hue,  it  massacres  all  the 
shadowed.  They  are  honoured,  after  a  fashion,  at  a  certain 
elevation.  Descending  from  it,  and  purely  to  breathe  com- 
mon air  (thus  in  her  mind),  they  are  scourged  and  outcast. 
And  alas!  the  very  pleading  for  them  excites  a  sort  of  ridi- 
cule in  their  advocate.  How  ?  She  was  utterly,  even  des- 
perately, nay  personally,  earnest,  and  her  humour  closed 
her  lips  ;  though  comical  views  of  the  scourged  and  outcast 
coming  from  the  opposite  party  —  the  huge  bully  world  — 


292  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

she  would  not  have  tolerated.  Diana  raged  at  a  prevailing 
strength  on  the  part  of  that  huge  bully  world,  which  seemed 
really  to  embrace  the  atmosphere.  Emma  had  said:  "The 
rules  of  Christian  Society  are  a  blessed  Government  for  us 
women.  We  owe  it  so  much  that  there  is  not  a  brick  of 
the  fabric  we  should  not  prop."  Emma's  talk  of  obedience 
to  the  Laws,  being  Laws,  was  repeated  by  the  rebel,  with 
an  involuntary  unphrased  comparison  of  the  vessel  in  dock 
and  the  vessel  at  sea. 

When  Dacier  next  called  to  see  Mrs.  Warwick,  he  heard 
that  she  had  gone  to  Copsley  for  a  couple  of  weeks.  The 
lesson  was  emphasized  by  her  not  writing :  —  and  was  it 
the  tricky  sex,  or  the  splendid  character  of  the  woman, 
which  dealt  him  this  punishment  ?  Knowing  how  much 
Diana  forfeited  for  him,  he  was  moved  to  some  enthusiasm, 
despite  his  inclination  to  be  hurt. 

She,  on  her  return  to  London,  gained  a  considerable  in- 
crease of  knowledge  as  to  her  position  in  the  eye  of  the 
world;  and  unlike  the  result  of  her  meditations  derived 
from  the  clamouring  tradesmen,  whom  she  could  excuse, 
she  was  neither  illuminated  nor  cautioned  by  that  dubious 
look ;  she  conscientiously  revolted.  Lady  Pennon  hinted 
a  word  for  her  government.  "A  good  deal  of  what  you 
so  capitally  call  '  Green  tea  talk '  is  going  on,  my  dear." 
Diana  replied,  without  pretending  to  misunderstand  :  *'  Gos- 
sip is  a  beast  of  prey  that  does  not  wait  for  the  death  of  the 
creature  it  devours.  They  are  welcome  to  my  shadow,  if 
the  liberty  I  claim  casts  one,  and  it  feeds  them."  To  which 
the  old  lady  rejoined:  "Oh!  I  am  with  you  through  thick 
and  thin.  I  presented  you  at  Court,  and  I  stand  by  you. 
Only,  walk  carefully.  Women  have  to  walk  with  a  train. 
You  are  too  famous  not  to  have  your  troops  of  watchers." 

"  But  I  mean  to  prove,"  said  Diana,  "that  a  woman  can 
walk  with  her  train  independent  of  the  common  reserves 
and  artifices." 

"  Not  on  highways,  my  dear  !  " 

Diana,  praising  the  speaker,  referred  the  whole  truth  in 
that  to  the  material  element  of  her  metaphor. 

She  was  more  astonished  by  Whitmonby's  candid  chid- 
ing; but  with  him  she  could  fence,  and  men  are  easily 
diverted.     She  had  sent  for  him,  to  bring  him  and  Percy 


THE  POLITICAL  AND  THE  DOMESTIC   CRISIS       293 

Dacier  together  to  a  conference.  Unaware  of  the  project, 
he  took  the  opportunity  of  their  privacy  to  speak  of  the 
great  station  open  to  her  in  London  being  imperilled ;  and 
he  spoke  of  "tongues,"  and  ahem!  A  very  little  would 
have  induced  him  to  fill  that  empty  vocable  with  a  name. 

She  had  to  pardon  the  critic  in  him  for  an  unpleasant 
review  of  her  hapless  Cantatrice  ;  and  as  a  means  of  eva- 
sion, she  mentioned  the  poor  book  and  her  slaughter  of  the 
heroine,  that  he  had  complained  of. 

"I  killed  her ;  I  could  not  let  her  live.  You  were  unjust 
in  accusing  the  authoress  of  heartlessness." 

"  If  I  did,  I  retract,"  said  he.  "  She  steers  too  evi- 
dently from  the  centre  of  the  vessel.  She  has  the  organ 
in  excess." 

"  Proof  that  it  is  not  squandered." 

^'  The  point  concerns  direction." 

*'  Have  I  made  so  bad  a  choice  of  my  friends  ?  " 

"  It  is  the  common  error  of  the  sprightly  to  suppose  that 
in  parrying  a  thrust  they  blind  our  eyes." 

"  The  world  sees  always  what  it  desires  to  see,  Mr. 
Whitmonby." 

"The  world,  my  dear  Mrs.  Warwick,  is  a  blundering 
machine  upon  its  own  affairs,  but  a  cruel  sleuth-hound  to 
rouse  in  pursuit." 

"  So  now  you  have  me  chased  by  sight  and  scent.  And 
if  I  take  wing  ?  " 

"Shots!  volleys! — You  are  lawful  game.  The  choice 
you  have  made  of  your  friends,  should  oblige  you  to  think 
of  them." 

"  I  imagine  I  do.     Have  I  offended  any,  or  one  ?  " 

"I  will  not  say  that.  You  know  the  commotion  in  a 
French  kitchen  when  the  guests  of  the  house  declined  a 
particular  dish  furnished  them  by  command.  The  cook 
and  his  crew  were  loyal  to  their  master,  but,  for  the  love 
of  their  Art,  they  sent  him  notice.  It  is  ill  serving  a  mad 
sovereign." 

Diana  bowed  to  the  compact  little  apologue. 

"I  will  tell  you  another  story,  traditional  in  our  family 
from  my  great-grandmother,  a  Spanish  woman,"  she  said. 
"A  cavalier  serenaded  his  mistress,  and  rascal  mercenaries 
fell  upon  him  before  he  could  draw  sword.     He  battered 


294  DIAXA   OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

liis  guitar  on  their  pates  till  the  lattice  opened  with  a  cry, 
and  startled  them  to  flight.  '  Thrice  blessed  and  beloved! ' 
he  called  to  her  above,  in  reference  to  the  noise,  *  it  was 
merely  a  diversion  of  the  accompaniment.'  Now  there 
was  loyal  service  to  a  sovereign !  " 

"You  are  certainly  an  angel!"  exclaimed  Whitmonby. 
"  I  swallow  the  story,  and  leave  it  to  digestion  to  discover 
the  appositeness.  Whatever  tuneful  instrument  one  of 
your  friends  possesses  shall  solace  your  slumbers  or  batter 
the  pate  of  your  enemy.  But  discourage  the  habitual 
serenader." 

"The  musician  you  must  mean  is  due  here  now,  by 
appointment  to  meet  you,"  said  Diana,  and  set  him  mo- 
mentarily agape  with  the  name  of  Mr.  Percy  Dacier. 

That  was  the  origin  of  the  alliance  between  the  young 
statesman  and  a  newspaper  editor.  Whitmonby,  accept- 
ing proposals  which  suited  him,  quitted  the  house,  after  an 
hour  of  political  talk,  no  longer  inclined  to  hint  at  the 
"habitual  serenader,"  but  very  ready  to  fall  foul  of  those 
who  did,  as  he  proved  when  the  numbers  buzzed  openly. 
Times  were  masculine;  the  excitement  on  the  eve  of  so 
great  a  crisis,  and  Diana's  comprehension  of  it  and  fine 
heading  cry,  put  that  weak  matter  aside.  Moreover,  he 
was  taught  to  suppose  himself  as  welcome  a  guest  as 
Dacier;  and  the  cook  could  stand  criticism;  the  wines  — 
wonderful  to  say  of  a  lady's  table  —  were  trusty;  the  talk, 
on  the  political  evenings  and  the  social  and  anecdotal 
supper-nights,  ran  always  in  perfect  accord  with  his  ideal 
of  the  conversational  orchestra:  an  improvized  harmony, 
unmatched  elsewhere.  She  did  not,  he  considered,  so  per- 
fectly assort  her  dinner-guests;  that  was  her  one  fault. 
She  had  therefore  to  strain  her  adroitness  to  cover  their 
deficiencies  and  fuse  them.  But  what  other  woman  could 
have  done  it!  She  led  superbly.  If  an  Irishman  was 
present,  she  kept  him  from  overflooding,  managed  to  ex- 
tract just  the  flavour  of  him,  the  smack  of  salt.  She  did 
even,  at  W^hitmonby's  table,  on  a  red-letter  Sunday  even- 
ing, in  concert  with  him  and  the  Dean,  bring  down  that 
cataract,  the  Bodleian,  to  the  levels  of  interchanging  dia- 
logue by  seasonable  touches,  inimitably  done,  and  never 
done  before.     Sullivan  Smith,  unbridled  in  the  middle  of 


A  LITTLE  DINNER   AND  AN   AFTERTASTE         295 

dinner,  was  docile  to  her.  "Irishmen,"  she  said,  pleading 
on  their  behalf  to  Whitmonby,  who  pronounced  the  race 
too  raw  for  an  Olympian  feast,  "are  invaluable  if  you  hang 
them  up  to  smoke  and  curej"  and  the  master  of  social 
converse  could  not  deny  that  they  were  responsive  to  her 
magic.  The  supper-nights  were  mainly  devoted  to  Percy's 
friends.  He  brought  as  many  as  he  pleased,  and  as  often 
as  it  pleased  him;  and  it  was  her  pride  to  provide  Cleopatra 
banquets  for  the  lover  whose  anxieties  were  soothed  by 
them,  and  to  whom  she  sacrificed  her  name  willingly  in 
return  for  a  generosity  that  certain  chance  whispers  of  her 
heart  elevated  to  the  pitch  of  measureless. 

So  they  wore  through  the  Session  and  the  Autumn,  clouds 
heavier,  the  League  drumming,  the  cry  of  Ireland  "omi- 
nously Banshee,"  as  she  wrote  to  Emma. 


CHAPTER  XXX 

IN   WHICH   THERE   IS   A  TASTE   OF   A   LITTLE  DINNER   AND 

AN   AFTERTASTE 

"But  Tony  lives!"  Emma  Dunstane  cried,  on  her  soli- 
tary height,  with  the  full  accent  of  envy  marking  the  verb; 
and  when  she  wrote  enviously  to  her  friend  of  the  life 
among  bright  intelligences,  and  of  talk  worth  hearing,  it 
was  a  happy  signification  that  health,  frail  though  it  might 
be,  had  grown  importunate  for  some  of  the  play  of  life. 
Diana  sent  her  word  to  name  her  day,  and  she  would  have 
her  choicest  to  meet  her  dearest.  They  were  in  the  early 
days  of  December,  not  the  best  of  times  for  improvized 
gatherings.  Emma  wanted,  however,  to  taste  them  as  they 
cropped;  she  was  also,  owing  to  her  long  isolation,  timid 
at  a  notion  of  encountering  the  pick  of  the  London  world, 
prepared  by  Tony  to  behold  "a  wonder  more  than  worthy 
of  them,"  as  her  friend  unadvisedly  wrote.  That  was  why 
she  came  unexpectedly,  and  for  a  mixture  of  reasons,  went 
to  an  hotel.  Fatality  designed  it  so.  She  was  reproached, 
but  she  said:  "You  have  to  write  or  you  entertain  at  night; 


296  DIANA  OF  THE   CEOSSWAYS 

I  should  be  a  clog  and  fret  you.  My  hotel  is  Maitland's; 
excellent;  I  believe  I  am  to  lie  on  the  pillow  where  a 
crowned  head  reposed !  You  will  perceive  that  I  am  proud 
as  well  as  comfortable.  And  I  would  rather  meet  your 
usual  set  of  guests." 

"  The  reason  why  I  have  been  entertaining  at  night  is, 
that  Percy  is  harassed  and  requires  enlivening,"  said 
Diana.  "He  brings  his  friends.  My  house  is  open  to 
them,  if  it  amuses  him.  What  the  world  says,  is  past  a 
thought.     I  owe  him  too  much." 

Emma  murmured  that  the  world  would  soon  be  pacified. 

Diana  shook  her  head.  "The  poor  man  is  better;  able 
to  go  about  his  affairs;  and  I  am  honestly  relieved.  It 
lays  a  spectre.  As  for  me,  I  do  not  look  ahead.  I  serve 
as  a  kind  of  secretary  to  Percy.  I  labour  at  making 
abstracts  by  day,  and  at  night  preside  at  my  supper-table. 
You  would  think  it  monotonous;  no  incident  varies  the 
course  we  run.  I  have  not  time  to  ask  whether  it  is  hap- 
piness.    It  seems  to  bear  a  resemblance." 

Emma  replied:  "He  may  be  everything  you  tell  me. 
He  should  not  have  chosen  the  last  night  of  the  Opera  to 
go  to  your  box  and  sit  beside  you  till  the  fall  of  the  cur- 
tain. The  presence  at  the  Opera  of  a  man  notoriously 
indifferent  to  music  was  enough  in  itself." 

Diana  smiled  with  languor.  "You  heard  of  that?  But 
the  Opera  was  The  Puritani,  my  favourite.  And  he  saw 
me  sitting  in  Lady  Pennon's  box  alone.  We  were  com- 
promised neck-deep  already.  I  can  kiss  you,  my  own 
Emmy,  till  I  die;  but  what  the  world  says,  is  what  the 
wind  says.  Besides  he  has  his  hopes.  ...  If  I  am  black- 
ened ever  so  thickly,  he  can  make  me  white.  Dear  me! 
if  the  world  knew  that  he  comes  here  almost  nightly  !  It 
will;  and  does  it  matter?  I  am  his  in  soul;  the  rest  is 
waste-paper  —  a  half-printed  sheet." 

"Provided  he  is  worthy  of  such  devotion! " 

"He  is  absolute  worthiness.  He  is  the  prince  of  men: 
I  dread  to  say,  mine  !  for  fear.  But  Emmy  will  not  judge 
him  to-morrow  by  contrast  with  more  voluble  talkers.  —  I 
can  do  anything  but  read  poetry  now.  That  kills  me!  — 
See  him  through  me.  In  nature,  character,  intellect,  he 
has  no  rival.     Whenever  I  despond  —  and  it  comes  now 


A  LITTLE  DINNER   AND  AN  AFTERTASTE         297 

and  then  —  I  rebuke  myself  with  this  one  admonition : 
Simply  to  have  known  him !  Admit  that  for  a  woman  to 
find  one  who  is  worthy  among  the  opposite  creatures,  is  a 
happy  termination  of  her  quest,  and  in  some  sort  dis- 
misses her  to  the  Shades,  an  uncomplaining  ferry-bird. 
If  my  end  were  at  hand  I  should  have  no  cause  to  lament 
it.  We  women  miss  life  only  when  we  have  to  confess  we 
have  never  met  the  man  to  reverence." 

Emma  had  to  hear  a  very  great  deal  of  Mr.  Percy. 
Diana's  comparison  of  herself  to  "the  busy  bee  at  a 
window-pane,"  was  more  in  her  old  manner;  and  her 
friend  would  have  hearkened  to  the  marvels  of  the  gentle- 
man less  unrefreshed,  had  it  not  appeared  to  her  that  her 
Tony  gave  in  excess  for  what  was  given  in  return.  She 
hinted  her  view. 

"It  is  expected  of  our  sex,"  Diana  said. 

The  work  of  busy  bee  at  a  window-pane  had  at  any  rate 
not  spoilt  her  beauty,  though  she  had  voluntarily,  profit- 
lessly,  become  this  man's  drudge,  and  her  sprightly  fancy, 
her  ready  humour  and  darting  look  all  round  in  discussion, 
were  rather  deadened. 

But  the  loss  was  not  perceptible  in  the  circle  of  her 
guests.  Present  at  a  dinner  little  indicating  the  last,  were 
Whitmonby,  in  lively  trim  for  shuffling,  dealing,  cutting, 
trumping  or  drawing  trumps;  Westlake,  polishing  epi- 
grams under  his  eyelids;  Henry  Wilmers,  who  timed  an 
anecdote  to  strike  as  the  passing  hour  without  freezing 
the  current;  Sullivan  Smith,  smoked,  cured  and  ready  to 
flavour;  Percy  Dacier,  pleasant  listener,  measured  speaker; 
and  young  Arthur  Rhodes,  the  neophyte  of  the  hostess's 
training;  of  whom  she  had  said  to  Emma,  "The  dear  boy 
very  kindly  serves  to  frank  an  unlicenced  widow;"  and 
whom  she  prompted  and  made  her  utmost  of,  with  her 
natural  tact.  These  she  mixed  and  leavened.  The  talk 
was  on  high  levels  and  low;  an  enchantment  to  Emma 
Dunstane:  now  a  story;  a  question  opening  new  routes; 
sharp  sketches  of  known  personages;  a  paradox  shot  by 
laughter  as  soon  as  uttered;  and  all  so  smoothly;  not  a 
shadow  of  the  dominant  holder-forth  or  a  momentary  pros- 
pect of  dead  flats;  the  mellow  ring  of  appositeness  being 
the  concordant  note  of  deliveries  running  linked  as  they 


298  BIAKA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

flashed,  and  a  tolerant  philosopliy  of  the  sage  in  the  world 
recurrently  the  keynote. 

Once  only  had  Diana  to  protect  her  nurseling.  He  cited 
a  funny  line  from  a  recent  popular  volume  of  verse,  in 
perfect  a  propos,  looking  at  Sullivan  Smith;  who  replied, 
that  the  poets  had  become  too  many  for  him,  and  he  read 
none  now.  Diana  said :  "  There  are  many  Alexanders, 
but  Alexander  of  Macedon  is  not  dwarfed  by  the  number." 
She  gave  him  an  opening  for  a  smarter  reply,  but  he  lost 
it  in  a  comment  —  against  Whitmonby's  cardinal  rule : 
"  The  neatest  turn  of  the  wrist  that  ever  swung  a  hero  to 
crack  a  crown!"  and  he  bowed  to  young  Ehodes:  "I'll 
read  your  versicler  to-morrow  morning  early."  The  latter 
expressed  a  fear  that  the  hour  was  too  critical  for  poetry. 

"I  have  taken  the  dose  at  a  very  early  hour,"  said 
Whitmonby,  to  bring  conversation  to  the  flow  again,  "  and 
it  effaced  the  critical  mind  completely." 

"But  did  not  silence  the  critical  nose,"  observed 
Westlake. 

Wilmers  named  the  owner  of  the  longest  nose  in 
Europe. 

"  Potentially,  indeed  a  critic  !  "  said  Diana. 

"iS"ights  beside  it  must  be  fearful,  and  good  matter  for 
a  divorce,  if  the  poor  dear  lady  could  hale  it  to  the  doors 
of  the  Vatican !  "  Sullivan  Smith  exclaimed.  "  But  there  's 
character  in  noses." 

"  Calculable  by  inches?  "  Dacier  asked. 

"More  than  in  any  other  feature,"  said  Lady  Dunstane. 
"The  Riffords  are  all  prodigiously  gifted  and  amusing: 
suspendens  omnia  naso.  It  should  be  prayed  for  in 
families." 

"Totum  ut  te  faciant,  Fabulle,  nasum,"  rejoined  Whit- 
monby. "Lady  Isabella  was  reading  the  tale  of  the 
German  princess,  who  had  a  sentinel  stationed  some  hun- 
dred yards  away  to  whisk  off  the  flies,  and  she  owned  to 
me  that  her  hand  instinctively  travelled  upward." 

"Candour  is  the  best  concealment,  when  one  has  to  carry 
a  saddle  of  absurdity,"  said  Diana.  "Touchstone's  'poor 
thing,  but  mine  own,'  is  godlike  in  its  enveloping  fold." 

"The  most  comforting  sermon  ever  delivered  on  prop* 
erty  in  poverty,"  said  Arthur  Rhodes. 


A  LITTLE  DINNER   AND  AN  AFTERTASTE  299 

Westlake  assented.  "  His  choice  of  Audrey  strikes  me 
as  an  exhibition  of  the  sure  instinct  for  pasture  of  the 
philosophical  jester  in  a  forest." 

"  With  nature's  woman,  if  he  can  find  her,  the  urban 
seems  equally  at  home,"  said  Lady  Dunstane. 

" Baron  Pawle  is  an  example,"  added  Whitmonby.  "  His 
cook  is  a  pattern  wife  to  him.  I  heard  him  say  at  table 
that  she  was  responsible  for  all  except  the  wines.  '  I 
would  n't  have  them  on  my  conscience,  with  a  Judge ! '  my 
lady  retorted." 

"When  poor  Madame  de  Jacquieres  was  dying,"  said 
Wilmers,  "  her  confessor  sat  by  her  bedside,  prepared  for 
his  ministrations.  '  Pom'  commencer,  mon  ami^  jamais  je 
n^aifais  rien  hors  nature.^  " 

Lord  Wadaster  had  uttered  something  tolerably  simi- 
lar: "I  am  a  sinner,  and  in  good  society."  Sir  Abraham 
Hartiston,  a  minor  satellite  of  the  Regent,  diversified 
this:  "I  am  a  sinner,  and  go  to  good  society."  Madame 
la  Comtesse  de  la  Roche-Aigle,  the  cause  of  many  deaths, 
declared  it  unwomanly  to  fear  anything  save  "Zes  reve- 
nants."  Yet  the  countess  could  say  the  pretty  thing: 
"Foot  on  a  flower,  then  think  of  me!" 

"Sentimentality  puts  up  infant  hands  for  absolution," 
said  Diana. 

"But  tell  me,"  Lady  Dunstane  inquired  generally,  "why 
men  are  so  much  happier  than  women  in  laughing  at  their 
spouses?  " 

They  are  humaner,  was  one  dictum;  they  are  more 
frivolous,  ironically  another. 

"  It  warrants  them  for  blowing  the  bugle-horn  of  mascu- 
line superiority  night  and  morning  from  the  castle-walls," 
Diana  said. 

"I  should  imagine  it  is  for  joy  of  heart  that  they  still 
have  cause  to  laugh!  "  said  Westlake. 

On  the  other  hand,  are  women  really  pained  by  having 
to  laugh  at  their  lords?  Curious  little  speeches  flying 
about  the  great  world,  affirmed  the  contrary.  But  the 
fair  speakers  were  chartered  libertines,  and  their  laugh 
admittedly  had  a  biting  acid.  The  parasite  is  concerned 
in  the  majesty  of  the  tree. 

"We  have  entered  Botany  Bay,"  Diana  said  to  Emma; 


300  DIANA   OP  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

who  answered:  "A  metaphor  is  the  Deus  ex  machine  of 
an  argument;"  and  Whitmonby,  to  lighten  a  shadow  of 
heaviness,  related  allusively  an  anecdote  of  the  Law- 
Courts.  Sullivan  Smith  begged  permission  to  "  black  cap  " 
it  with  Judge  FitzGerald's  sentence  upon  a  convicted  crim- 
inal: "Your  plot  was  perfect  but  for  One  above."  Dacier 
cited  an  execrable  impromptu  line  of  the  Chief  of  the 
Opposition  in  Parliament.  The  Premier,  it  was  remarked, 
played  him  like  an  angler  his  fish  on  the  hook;  or  say,  Mr. 
Serjeant  Eufus  his  witness  in  the  box. 

"Or  a  French  journalist  an  English  missionary,"  said 
Westlake;  and  as  the  instance  was  recent  it  was  relished. 

The  talk  of  Premiers  offered  Whitmonby  occasion  for  a 
flight  to  the  Court  of  Vienna  and  Kaunitz.  Wilmers  told 
a  droll  story  of  Lord  Busby's  missing  the  Embassy  there. 
Westlake  furnished  a  sample  of  the  tranquil  sententious- 
ness  of  Busby's  brother  Kobert  during  a  stormy  debate  in 
the  House  of  Commons. 

"I  remember,"  Dacier  was  reminded,  "hearing  him  say, 
when  the  House  resembled  a  Chartist  riot,  *  Let  us  stand 
aside  and  meditate  on  Life.  If  Youth  could  know,  in  the 
season  of  its  reaping  of  the  Pleasures,  that  it  is  but  sowing 
Doctor's  bills!  '" 

Latterly  a  malady  had  supervened,  and  Bob  Busby  had 
retired  from  the  universal  to  the  special;  —  his  mysterious 
case. 

"  Assure  him,  that  is  endemic.  He  may  be  cured  of  his 
desire  for  the  exposition  of  it,"  said  Lady  Dunstane. 

Westlake  chimed  with  her:  "Yes,  the  charm  in  dis- 
coursing of  one's  case  is  over  when  the  individual  appears 
no  longer  at  odds  with  Providence." 

"But  then  we  lose  our  Tragedy,"  said  Whitmonby. 

" Our  Comedy  too,"  added  Diana.  "We  must  consent  to 
be  Busbied  for  the  sake  of  the  instructive  recreations." 

"A  curious  idea,  though,"  said  Sullivan  Smith,  "that 
some  of  the  grand  instructive  figures  were  in  their  day 
colossal  bores ! " 

"So  you  see  the  marvel  of  the  poet's  craft  at  last?" 
Diana  smiled  on  him,  and  he  vowed:  "I'll  read  nothing 
else  for  a  month."  Young  Rhodes  bade  him  beware  of  a 
deluge  in  proclaiming  it. 


A  LITTLE  DINNER  AND  AN  AFTERTASTE  301 

They  rose  from  table  at  ten,  with  the  satisfaction  of 
knowing  that  they  had  not  argued,  had  not  wrangled,  had 
never  stagnated,  and  were  digestingly  refreshed;  as  it 
should  be  among  grown  members  of  the  civilized  world, 
who  mean  to  practise  philosophy,  making  the  hour  of  the 
feast  a  balanced  recreation  and  a  regeneration  of  body  and 
mind.     ^ 

"Evenings  like  these  are  worth  a  pilgrimage,"  Emma 
said,  embracing  Tony  outside  the  drawing-room  door.  "I 
am  so  glad  I  came :  and  if  I  am  strong  enough,  invite  me 
again  in  the  Spring.  To-morrow  early  I  start  for  Copsley, 
to  escape  this  London  air.  I  shall  hope  to  have  you  there 
soon." 

She  was  pleased  by  hearing  Tony  ask  her  whether  she 
did  not  think  that  Arthur  Rhodes  had  borne  himself  well ; 
for  it  breathed  of  her  simply  friendly  soul. 

The  gentlemen  followed  Lady  Dunstane  in  a  troop, 
Dacier  yielding  perforce  the  last  adieu  to  young  Rhodes. 

Five  minutes  later  Diana  was  in  her  dressing-room, 
where  she  wrote  at  night,  on  the  rare  occasions  now  when 
she  was  left  free  for  composition.  Beginning  to  dwell  on 
The  Man-  of  Two  Minds,  she  glanced  at  the  woman  like- 
wise divided,  if  not  similarly;  and  she  sat  brooding.  She 
did  not  accuse  her  marriage  of  being  the  first  fatal  step : 
her  error  was  the  step  into  Society  without  the  wherewithal 
to  support  her  position  there.  Girls  of  her  kind,  airing 
their  wings  above  the  sphere  of  their  birth,  are  cryingly 
adventuresses.  As  adventuresses  they  are  treated.  Vain 
to  be  shrewish  with  the  world!  Rather  let  us  turn  and 
scold  our  nature  for  irreflectively  rushing  to  the  cream  and 
honey !  Had  she  subsisted  on  her  small  income  in  a  coun- 
try cottage,  this  task  of  writing  would  have  been  holiday. 
Or  better,  if,  as  she  preached  to  Mary  Paynham,  she  had 
apprenticed  herself  to  some  productive  craft.  The  sim- 
plicity of  the  life  of  labour  looked  beautiful.  What  will 
not  look  beautiful  contrasted  with  the  fly  in  the  web  ? 
She  had  chosen  to  be  one  of  the  flies  of  life. 

Instead  of  running  to  composition,  her  mind  was  elo- 
quent with  a  sermon  to  Arthur  Rhodes,  in  Redworth's 
vein;  more  sympathetically,  of  course.  "For  I  am  not 
one  of  the  lecturing  Mammonites  ! "  she  could  say. 


302  DIANA   OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

She  was  far  from  that.  Penitentially,  in  the  thick  of 
her  disdain  of  the  arrogant  money-getters,  she  pulled  out 
a  drawer  where  her  bank-book  lay,  and  observed  it  con- 
templatively; jotting  down  a  reflection  before  the  dread 
book  of  facts  was  opened :  "  Gaze  on  the  moral  path  you 
should  have  taken,  you  are  asked  for  courage  to  commit  a 
sanctioned  suicide,  by  walking  back  to  it  stripped  —  a 
skeleton  self."  She  sighed  forth :  "  But  I  have  no  courage  : 
I  never  had! " 

The  book  revealed  its  tale  in  a  small  pencilled  compu- 
tation of  the  bank-clerk's,  on  the  peccant  side.  Credit 
presented  many  pages  blanks.  She  seemed  to  have  with- 
drawn from  the  struggle  with  such  a  partner. 

It  signified  an  immediate  appeal  to  the  usurers,  unless 
the  publisher  could  be  persuaded,  with  three  parts  of  the 
book  in  his  hands,  to  come  to  the  rescue.  Work!  roared 
old  Debit,  the  sinner  turned  slavedriver. 

Diana  smoothed  her  wrists,  compressing  her  lips  not  to 
laugh  at  the  simulation  of  an  attitude  of  combat.  She 
took  up  her  pen. 

And  strange  to  think,  she  could  have  flowed  away  at 
once  on  the  stuff  that  Danvers  delighted  to  read !  —  wicked 
princes,  rogue  noblemen,  titled  wantons,  daisy  and  lily 
innocents,  traitorous  marriages,  murders,  a  gallows  dang- 
ling a  corpse  dotted  by  a  moon,  and  a  woman  bowed  be- 
neath. She  could  have  written,  with  the  certainty  that  in 
the  upper  and  the  middle  as  well  as  in  the  lower  classes 
of  the  country,  there  would  be  a  multitude  to  read  that 
stuff,  so  cordially,  despite  the  gaps  between  them,  are 
they  one  in  their  literary  tastes.  And  why  should  they 
not  read  it  ?  Her  present  mood  was  a  craving  for  excite- 
ment; for  incident,  wild  action,  the  primitive  machinery 
of  our  species;  any  amount  of  theatrical  heroics,  pathos, 
and  clown-gabble.  A  panorama  of  scenes  came  sweeping 
round  her. 

She  was,  however,  harnessed  to  a  different  kind  of 
vehicle,  and  had  to  drag  it.  The  sound  of  the  house-door 
shutting,  imagined  perhaps,  was  a  fugitive  distraction. 
Now  to  animate  The  Man  of  Two  Minds! 

He  is  courting,  but  he  is  burdened  with  the  task  of 
tasks.     He  has  an  ideal  of  womanhood  and  of  the  union 


GREAT   POLITICAL  NEWS  303 

of  couples:  a  delicacy  extreme  as  his  attachment:  and  he 
must  induce  the  lady  to  school  herself  to  his  ideal,  not 
allowing  her  to  suspect  him  less  devoted  to  her  person; 
while  she,  an  exacting  idol,  will  drink  any  quantity  of 
idealization  as  long  as  he  starts  it  from  a  full  acceptance 
of  her  acknowledged  qualities.  Diana  could  once  have 
tripped  the  scene  along  airily.  She  stared  at  the  opening 
sentence,  a  heavy  bit  of  moralized  manufacture,  fit  to  yoke 
beside  that  on  her  view  of  her  bank-book. 

"It  has  come  to  this  —  I  have  no  head,"  she  cried. 

And  is  our  public  likely  to  muster  the  slightest  taste  for 
comic  analysis  that  does  not  tumble  to  farce?  The  doubt 
reduced  her  whole  MS.  to  a  leaden  weight,  composed  for 
sinking.  Percy's  addiction  to  burlesque  was  a  further 
hindrance,  for  she  did  not  perceive  how  her  comedy  could 
be  strained  to  gratify  it. 

There  was  a  knock,  and  Danvers  entered. 

"You  have  apparently  a  liking  for  late  hours,"  observed 
her  mistress.     "I  told  you  to  go  to  bed." 

"It  is  Mr.  Dacier,"  said  Danvers. 

"He  wishes  to  see  me?" 

"Yes,  ma'am.     He  apologized  for  disturbing  you." 

"He  must  have  some  good  reason." 

What  could  it  be!  Diana's  glass  approved  her  appear- 
ance. She  pressed  the  black  swell  of  hair  above  her 
temples,  rather  amazed,  curious,  inclined  to  a  beating  of 
the  heart. 


CHAPTER   XXXI 

A    CHAPTER   CONTAINING    GREAT    POLITICAL    NEWS    AND 
THEREWITH    AN    INTRUSION    OF    THE   LOVE-GOD. 

Dacier  was  pacing  about  the  drawing-room,  as  in  a  place 
too  narrow  for  him. 

Diana  stood  at  the  door.  "Have  you  forgotten  to  tell 
me  anything  I  ought  to  know?  " 

He  came  up  to  her  and  shut  the  door  softly  behind  her, 
holding  her  hand.     "You  are  near  it.      I  returned  *  .  • 


304  DIANA  OP  THE  CROSSWAYS 

But  tell  me  first :  —  You  were  slightly  under  a  shadow  this 
evening,  dejected." 

"Did  I  show  it?" 

She  was  growing  a  little  suspicious,  but  this  cunning 
touch  of  lover-like  interest  dispersed  the  shade. 

"To  me  you  did." 

"It  was  unpardonable  to  let  it  be  seen." 

"No  one  else  could  have  observed  it." 

Her  woman's  heart  was  thrilled;  for  she  had  concealed 
the  dejection  from  Emma. 

"It  was  nothing,"  she  said;  "a  knot  in  the  book  I  am 
writing.  We  poor  authors  are  worried  now  and  then. 
But  you?  " 

His  face  rippled  by  degrees  brightly,  to  excite  a  reflec- 
tion in  hers. 

"Shall  I  tune  you  with  good  news?  I  think  it  will 
excuse  me  for  coming  back." 

"  Very  good  news  ?  " 

"Brave  news,  as  far  as  it  goes." 

"  Then  it  concerns  you  ! " 

"Me,  you,  the  country." 

"Oh!  do  I  guess?"  cried  Diana.  "But  speak,  pray;  I 
burn." 

"  What  am  I  to  have  for  telling  it  ?  " 

"Put  no  price.  You  know  my  heart.  I  guess  —  or 
fancy.     It  relates  to  your  Chief  ?  " 

Dacier  smiled  in  a  way  to  show  the  lock  without  the 
key;  and  she  was  insensibly  drawn  nearer  to  him,  specu- 
lating on  the  smile. 

"Try  again,"  said  he,  keenly  appreciating  the  blindness 
to  his  motive  of  her  studious  dark  eyes,  and  her  open- 
lipped  breathing. 

"  Percy  !     I  must  be  right." 

"  Well,  you  are.     He  has  decided ! " 

"  Oh !  that  is  the  bravest  possible.    When  did  you  hear?  " 

"He  informed  me  of  his  final  decision  this  afternoon." 

"And  you  were  charged  with  the  secret  all  the  evening, 
and  betrayed  not  a  sign !  I  compliment  the  diplomatic 
statesman.     But  when  will  it  be  public?  " 

"  He  calls  Parliament  together  the  first  week  of  next 
month." 


GREAT  POLITICAL  NEWS  305 

"  The  proposal  is  —  ?    No  more  compromises ! " 

"Total!" 

Diana  clapped  hands ;  and  her  aspect  of  enthusiasm  was 
intoxicating.  "  He  is  a  wise  man  and  a  gallant  Minister  ! 
And  while  you  were  reading  me  through,  I  was  blind  to 
you,"  she  added  meltingly. 

"  I  have  not  made  too  much  of  it  ?  "  said  he. 

"Indeed  you  have  not." 

She  was  radiant  with  her  dark  lightnings,  yet  visibly 
subject  to  him  under  the  spell  of  the  news  he  had  artfully 
lengthened  out  to  excite  and  overbalance  her:  —  and  her 
enthusiasm  was  all  pointed  to  his  share  in  the  altered 
situation,  as  he  well  knew  and  was  flattered  in  knowing. 

"  So  Tony  is  no  longer  dejected  ?  I  thought  I  could 
freshen  you  and  get  my  excuse." 

"  Oh  !  a  high  wind  will  make  a  dead  leaf  fly  like  a  bird. 
I  soar.  jSTow  I  do  feel  proud.  I  have  longed  for  it  —  to 
have  you  leading  the  country:  not  tugged  at  like  a  waggon 
with  a  treble  team  uphill.  We  two  are  a  month  in  advance 
of  all  England.  You  stand  by  him  ?  —  only  to  hear  it,  for 
I  am  sure  of  it !  " 

"  We  stand  or  fall  together." 

Her  glowing  look  doated  on  the  faithful  lieutenant. 

"  And  if  the  henchman  is  my  hero  I  am  but  a  waiting- 
woman.     But  I  must  admire  his  leader." 

"Tony!" 

"Ah!  no,"  she  joined  her  hands,  wondering  whither 
her  armed  majesty  had  fled;  "no  softness!  no  payments  ! 
Flatter  me  by  letting  me  think  you  came  to  a  head  —  not 
a  silly  woman's  heart,  with  one  name  on  it,  as  it  has  not 
to  betray.  I  have  been  frank;  you  need  no  proofs  ..." 
The  supplicating  hands  left  her  figure  an  easy  prey  to  the 
storm,  and  were  crushed  in  a  knot  on  her  bosom.  She 
could  only  shrink.  "Ah!  Percy  .  .  .  you  undo  my  praise 
of  you  —  my  pride  in  receiving  you." 

They  were  speechless  perforce. 

"  You  see,  Tony,  my  dearest,  I  am  flesh  and  blood  after 
all." 

"You  drive  me  to  be  ice  and  door -bolts!  " 

Her  eyes  broke  over  him  reproachfully. 

"It  is  not  so  much  to  grant,"  he  murmured. 

20 


306  DIANA  OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

*'It  changes  everything  between  us." 

"Not  me.     It  binds  me  the  faster." 

"It  makes  me  a  loathsome  hypocrite." 

"  But,  Tony !  is  it  so  much  ?  " 

"Not  if  you  value  it  low." 

"  But  how  long  do  you  keep  me  in  this  rag-puppet's  state 
of  suspension  ?  " 

"Patience." 

"Dangling  and  swinging  day  and  night  !  " 

"  The  rag-puppet  shall  be  animated  and  repaid  if  I  have 
life.  I  wish  to  respect  my  hero.  Have  a  little  mercy. 
Our  day  will  come :  perhaps  as  wonderfully  as  this  won- 
derful news.  My  friend,  drop  your  hands.  Have  you 
forgotten  who  I  am  ?     I  want  to  think,  Percy  ! " 

"  But  you  are  mine." 

"  You  are  abasing  your  own." 

"  No,  by  heaven  ! " 

"Worse,  dear  friend;  you  are  lowering  yourself  to  the 
woman  who  loves  you." 

"  You  must  imagine  me  superhuman." 

"  I  worship  you  —  or  did." 

"Be  reasonable,  Tony.  What  harm!  Surely  a  trifle  of 
recompense  ?  Just  to  let  me  feel  I  live !  You  own  you 
love  me.     Then  I  am  your  lover." 

"  My  dear  friend  Percy,  when  I  have  consented  to  be 
your  paramour,  this  kind  of  treatment  of  me  will  not  want 
apologies." 

The  plain  speaking  from  the  wound  he  dealt  her  was 
effective  with  a  gentleman  who  would  never  have  enjoyed 
his  privileges  had  he  been  of  a  nature  unsusceptible  to  her 
distinct  wish  and  meaning. 

He  sighed.  "You  know  how  my  family  bother  me. 
The  woman  I  want,  the  only  woman  I  could  marry,  I 
can't  have." 

"  You  have  her  in  soul." 

"  Body  and  soul,  it  must  be !  I  believe  you  were  made 
without  fire." 

"  Perhaps.  The  element  is  omitted  with  some  of  us : 
happily,  some  think.  Now  we  can  converse.  There  seems 
to  be  a  measurement  of  distances  required  before  men  and 
women  have  a  chance  with  their  brains  :  — or  before  a  man 


GREAT   POLITICAL  NEWS  307 

will   understand   that   he   can   be    advised   and   seconded. 
When  will  the  Cabinet  be  consulted?" 

"  Oh,  a  few  days.     Promise  me  .  .  ." 

"Any  honourable  promise  !  " 

''You  will  not  keep  me  waiting  longer  than  the  end  of 
the  Session  ?  " 

"  Probably  there  will  be  an  appeal  to  the  country." 

''  In  any  case,  promise  me  :  have  some  compassion." 

"  Ah,  the  compassion !  You  do  not  choose  your  words, 
Percy,  or  forget  who  is  the  speaker." 

"  It  is  Tony  who  forgets  the  time  she  has  kept  her  lover 
dangling.     Promise,  and  I  will  wait." 

"  You  hurt  my  hand,  sir." 

"I  could  crack  the  knuckles.     Promise  ! '' 

"  Come  to  me  to-morrow." 

"  To-morrow  you  are  in  your  armour  —  triple  brass !  All 
creation  cries  out  for  now.  We  are  mounted  on  barbs  and 
you  talk  of  ambling." 

"  Arthur  Rhodes  might  have  spoken  that." 

"  Ehodes  !  "  he  shook  off  the  name  in  disgust.  "  Pet  him 
as  much  as  you  like ;  don't  .  .  ."  he  was  unable  to  phrase 
his  objection. 

She  cooled  him  further  with  eulogies  of  the  cheva- 
leresque  manner  of  speaking  which  young  Mr.  Rhodes 
could  assume ;  till  for  very  wrath  of  blood  —  not  jealousy  : 
he  had  none  of  any  man,  with  her ;  and  not  passion  j  the 
little  he  had  was  a  fitful  gust  —  he  punished  her  coldness 
by  taking  what  hastily  could  be  gathered. 

Her  shape  was  a  pained  submission ;  and  she  thought : 
Where  is  the  woman  who  ever  knows  a  man  !  —  as  women 
do  think  when  one  of  their  artifices  of  evasion  with  a  lover, 
or  the  trick  of  imposingness,  has  apparently  been  subduing 
him.  But  the  pain  was  less  than  previously,  for  she  was 
now  mistress  of  herself,  fearing  no  abysses. 

Dacier  released  her  quickly,  saying :  ''  If  I  come  to-mor- 
row, shall  I  have  the  promise  ?  " 

She  answered :  "  Be  sure  I  shall  not  lie." 

"  Why  not  let  me  have  it  before  I  go  ?  " 

''My  friend,  to  tell  you  the  truth,  you  have  utterly  dis- 
tracted me." 

"  Forgive  me  if  I  did  hurt  your  hand." 


308  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

''  The  hand  ?    You  might  strike  it  off/' 

"  I  can't  be  other  than  a  mortal  lover,  Tony.  There  's 
the  fact." 

"No;  the  fault  is  mine  when  I  am  degraded.  I  trust 
you  :  there 's  the  error." 

The  trial  for  Dacier  was  the  sight  of  her  quick-lifting 
bosom  under  the  mask  of  cold  language :  an  attraction  and 
repulsion  in  union ;  a  delirium  to  any  lover  impelled  to 
trample  on  weak  defences.  But  the  evident  pain  he  in- 
flicted moved  his  pity,  which  helped  to  restore  his  concep- 
tion of  the  beauty  of  her  character.  She  stood  so  nobly 
meek.  And  she  was  never  prudish,  only  self-respecting. 
Although  the  great  news  he  imparted  had  roused  an  ardent 
thirst  for  holiday  and  a  dash  out  of  harness,  and  he  could 
hardly  check  it,  he  yielded  her  the  lead. 

"  Trust  me  you  may,"  he  said.  "  But  you  know  we  are 
one.  The  world  has  given  you  to  me,  me  to  you.  Why 
should  we  be  asunder  ?     There  's  no  reason  in  it." 

She  replied :  *'  But  still  I  wish  to  burn  a  little  incense  in 
honour  of  myself,  or  else  I  cannot  live.  It  is  the  truth. 
You  make  Death  my  truer  friend,  and  at  this  moment  I 
would  willingly  go  out.  You  would  respect  me  more  dead 
than  alive.     I  could  better  pardon  you  too." 

He  pleaded  for  the  red  mouth's  pardon,  remotely  irri- 
tated by  the  suspicion  that  she  swayed  him  overmuch :  and 
he  had  deserved  the  small  benevolences  and  donations  of 
love,  crumbs  and  heavenly  dews  ! 

"  Not  a  word  of  pardon,"  said  Diana.  ''  I  shall  never 
count  an  iota  against  you  'in  the  dark  backward  and 
abysm  of  Time.'  This  news  is  great,  and  I  have  sunk 
beneath  it.  Come  to-morrow.  Then  we  will  speak  upon 
whatever  you  can  prove  rational.  The  hour  is  getting 
late." 

Dacier  took  a  draught  of  her  dark  beauty  with  the 
crimson  he  had  kindled  over  the  cheeks.  Her  lips  were 
firmly  closed,  her  eyes  grave ;  dry,  but  seeming  to  waver 
tearfully  in  their  heavy  fulness.  He  could  not  doubt  her 
love  of  him;  and  although  chafing  at  the  idea  that  she 
swayed  him  absurdly  —  beyond  the  credible  in  his  world  of 
wag-tongues  —  he  resumed  his  natural  soberness,  as  a  gar- 
ment, not  very  uneasily  fitting:    whence  it  ensued  —  for 


A  GIDDY  TUKN   AT  THE  SPECTRAL  CROSSWAYS      309 

SO  are  we  influenced  by  the  garb  we  put  on  us  —  that  his 
manly  sentiment  of  revolt  in  being  condemned  to  play 
second,  was  repressed  by  the  refreshment  breathed  on  him 
from  her  lofty  character,  the  pure  jewel  proffered  to  his 
inward  ownership. 

"  Adieu  for  the  night,"  he  said,  and  she  smiled.  He 
pressed  for  a  pressure  of  her  hand.  She  brightened  her 
smile  instead,  and  said  only :  *'  Good  night,  Percy." 


CHAPTER  XXXTI 

WHEREIN    WE   BEHOLD    A    GIDDY    TURN    AT   THE    SPECTRAL 

CROSSWAYS 

Danvers  accompanied  Mr.  Dacier  to  the  house-door. 
Climbing  the  stairs,  she  found  her  mistress  in  the  drawing- 
room  still. 

"You  must  be  cold,  ma'am,"  she  said,  glancing  at  the 
fire-grate. 

"  Is  it  a  frost  ?  "  said  Diana. 

"  It 's  midnight  and  midwinter,  ma'am." 

"  Has  it  struck  midnight  ?  " 

The  mantel-piece  clock  said  five  minutes  past. 

"You  had  better  go  to  bed,  Danvers,  or  you  will  lose 
your  bloom.  Stop  ;  you  are  a  faithful  soul.  Great  things 
are  happening  and  I  am  agitated.  Mr.  Dacier  has  told  me 
news.     He  came  back  purposely." 

"  Yes,  ma'am,"  said  Danvers.  "  He  had  a  great  deal  to 
tell  ?  " 

"Well,  he  had."  Diana  coloured  at  the  first  tentative 
impertinence  she  had  heard  from  her  maid.  "What  is  the 
secret  of  you,  Danvers  ?     What  attaches  you  to  me  ?  " 

"I'm  sure  I  don't  know,  ma'am.     I'm  romantic." 

"  And  you  think  me  a  romantic  object  ?  " 

"  I  'm  sure  I  can't  say,  ma'am.  I  'd  rather  serve  you  than 
any  other  lady ;  and  I  wish  you  was  happy." 

"  Do  you  suppose  I  am  unhappy  ?  " 


310  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  I  *m  sure  —  but  if  I  may  speak,  ma'am  :  so  handsome 
and  clever  a  lady  !  and  young !     I  can't  bear  to  see  it." 

*'  Tush,  you  silly  woman.  You  read  your  melting  tales, 
and  imagine.  I  must  go  and  write  for  money :  it  is  my 
profession.  And  I  haven't  an  idea  in  my  head.  This 
news  disturbs  me.  Kuin  if  I  don't  write ;  so  I  must.  —  I 
tan't ! " 

Diana  beheld  the  ruin.  She  clasped  the  great  news  for 
succour.  Great  indeed :  and  known  but  to  her  of  all  the 
outer  world.    She  was  ahead  of  all  —  ahead  of  Mr.  Tonans  ! 

The  visionary  figure  of  Mr.  Tonans  petrified  by  the 
great  news,  drinking  it,  and  confessing  her  ahead  of  him 
in  the  race  for  secrets,  arose  toweringly.  She  had  not  ever 
seen  the  Editor  in  his  den  at  midnight.  With  the  rumble 
of  his  machinery  about  him,  and  fresh  matter  arriving  and 
flying  into  the  printing-press,  it  must  be  like  being  in  the 
very  furnace-hissing  of  Events :  an  Olympian  Council  held 
in  Vulcan's  smithy.  Consider  the  bringing  to  the  Jove 
there  news  of  such  magnitude  as  to  stupefy  him !  He,  too, 
who  had  admonished  her  rather  sneeringly  for  staleness  in 
her  information.  But  this  news,  great  though  it  was,  and 
throbbing  like  a  heart  plucked  out  of  a  breathing  body, 
throbbed  but  for  a  brief  term,  a  day  or  two ;  after  which, 
great  though  it  was,  immense,  it  relapsed  into  a  common 
organ,  a  possession  of  the  multitude,  merely  historically 
curious. 

"  You  are  not  afraid  of  the  streets  at  night  ? "  Diana 
said  to  her  maid,  as  they  were  going  upstairs. 

"  Not  when  we  're  driving,  ma'am,"  was  the  answer. 

The  Man  of  Two  Minds  faced  his  creatrix  in  the 
dressing-room,  still  delivering  that  most  ponderous  of  sen- 
tences —  a  smothering  pillow  ! 

I  have  mistaken  my  vocation,  thought  Diana:  I  am 
certainly  the  flattest  proser  who  ever  penned  a  line. 

She  sent  Danvers  into  the  bedroom  on  a  trifling  errand, 
unable  to  bear  the  woman's  proximity,  and  oddly  unwilling 
to  dismiss  her. 

She  pressed  her  hands  on  her  eyelids.  Would  Percy 
have  humiliated  her  so  if  he  had  respected  her  ?  He  took 
advantage  of  the  sudden  loss  of  her  habitual  queenly  initia- 
tive at  the  wonderful  news  to  debase  and  stain  their  inti- 


A   GIDDY  TtJKN  AT  THE  SPECTRAL  CROSSWAYS      311 

macy.  The  lover's  behaviour  was  judged  by  her  sensa^ 
tions:  she  felt  humiliated,  plucked  violently  front  the 
throne  where  she  had  long  been  sitting  securely,  very 
proudly.  That  was  at  an  end.  If  she  was  to  be  better  than 
the  loathsomest  of  hypocrites,  she  must  deny  him  his 
admission  to  the  house.     And  then  what  was  her  life  ! 

Something  that  was  pressing  her  low,  she  knew  not  how, 
and  left  it  unquestioned,  incited  her  to  exaggerate  the 
indignity  her  pride  had  suffered.  She  was  a  dethroned 
woman.  Deeper  within,  an  unmasked  actress,  she  said. 
Oh,  she  forgave  him !  But  clearly  he  took  her  for  the  same 
as  other  women  consenting  to  receive  a  privileged  visitor. 
And  sounding  herself  to  the  soul,  was  she  so  magnificently 
better?  Her  face  flamed.  She  hugged  her  arms  at  her 
breast  to  quiet  the  beating,  and  dropped  them  when  she 
surprised  herself  embracing  the  memory.  He  had  brought 
political  news,  and  treated  her  as  — name  the  thing  !  Not 
designedly,  it  might  be  :  her  position  invited  it.  "  The 
world  had  given  her  to  him."  The  world  is  always  a 
prophet  of  the  mire ;  but  the  world  is  no  longer  an  utterly 
mistaken  world.     She  shook  before  it. 

She  asked  herself  why  Percy  or  the  world  should  think 
highly  of  an  adventuress,  who  was  a  denounced  wife,  a 
wretched  author,  and  on  the  verge  of  bankruptcy.  She  was 
an  adventuress.  When  she  held  The  Crossways  she  had 
at  least  a  bit  of  solid  footing :  now  gone.  An  adventu- 
ress without  an  idea  in  her  head:  witness  her  dullard. 
The  Man  of  Two  Minds,  at  his  work  of  sermonizing  his 
mistress. 

The  tremendous  pressure  upon  our  consciousness  of  the 
material  cause,  when  we  find  ourselves  cast  among  the 
breakers  of  moral  difficulties  and  endeavour  to  elude  that 
mud-visaged  monster,  chiefly  by  feigning  unconsciousness, 
was  an  experience  of  Diana's,  in  the  crisis  to  which  she  was 
wrought.  Her  wits  were  too  acute,  her  nature  too  direct, 
to  permit  of  a  lengthened  confusion.  She  laid  the  scourge 
on  her  flesh  smartly.  —  I  gave  him  these  privileges  because 
I  am  weak  as  the  weakest,  base  as  my  enemies  proclaim 
me.  I  covered  my  woman's  vile  weakness  with  an  air  of 
intellectual  serenity  that  he,  choosing  his  moment,  tore 
away,  exposing  me  to  myself,  as  well  as  to  him,  the  most 


312  DIANA   OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

ordinary  of  reptiles.  I  kept  up  a  costly  household  for  the 
sole  purpose  of  seeing  him  and  having  him  near  me. 
Hence  this  bitter  need  of  money!  —  Either  it  must  be 
money  or  disgrace.  Money  would  assist  her  quietly  to 
amend  and  complete  her  work.  Yes,  and  this  want  of 
money,  in  a  review  of  the  last  two  years,  was  the  material 
cause  of  her  recklessness.  It  was,  her  revived  and  uprising 
pudency  declared,  the  principal,  the  only  cause.  Mere 
want  of  money. 

And  she  had  a  secret  worth  thousands  !  The  secret  of  a 
day,  no  more  :  anybody's  secret  after  some  four  and  twenty 
hours. 

She  smiled  at  the  fancied  elongation  and  stare  of  the 
features  of  Mr.  Tonans  in  his  editorial  midnight  den. 

What  if  he  knew  it  and  could  cap  it  with  something 
novel  and  stranger  ?  Hardly.  But  it  was  an  inciting 
suggestion. 

She  began  to  tremble  as  a  lightning-flash  made  visible 
her  fortunes  recovered,  disgrace  averted,  hours  of  peace  for 
composition  stretching  before  her:  a  summer  afternoon's 
vista. 

It  seemed  a  duel  between  herself  and  Mr.  Tonans,  and 
she  sure  of  her  triumph  —  Diana  victrix  ! 

"  Danvers  ! "  she  called. 

"  Is  it  to  undress,  ma'am  ?  "  said  the  maid,  entering  to 
her. 

"  You  are  not  afraid  of  the  streets,  you  tell  me.  I  have 
to  go  down  to  the  City,  I  think.  It  is  urgent.  Yes,  I 
must  go.  If  I  were  to  impart  the  news  to  you,  your  head 
would  be  a  tolling  bell  for  a  month." 

**  You  will  take  a  cab,  ma'am." 

"  We  must  walk  out  to  find  one.  I  must  go,  though  I 
should  have  to  go  on  foot.  Quick  with  bonnet  and  shawl ; 
muffle  up  warmly.  We  have  never  been  out  so  late :  but 
does  it  matter  ?  You  're  a  brave  soul,  I  'm  sure,  and  you 
shall  have  your  fee." 

"  I  don't  care  for  money,  ma'am." 

"  When  we  get  home  you  shall  kiss  me." 

Danvers  clothed  her  mistress  in  furs  and  rich  wrappings : 
Not  paid  for  !  was  Diana's  desperate  thought,  and  a  wrong 
one  J  but  she  had  to  seem  the  precipitated  bankrupt  and 


A  GIDDY  TURN  AT  THE   SPECTRAL  CROSS  WAYS      313 

succeeded.  She  was  near  being  it.  The  boiling  of  her 
secret  carried  her  through  the  streets  rapidly  and  unobser- 
vantly  except  of  such  small  things  as  the  glow  of  the  lights 
on  the  pavements  and  the  hushed  cognizance  of  the  houses, 
in  silence  to  a  thoroughfare  where  a  willing  cabman  was 
met.  The  destination  named,  he  nodded  alertly :  he  had 
driven  gentlemen  there  at  night  from  the  House  of  Com- 
mons, he  said. 

"  Our  Parliament  is  now  sitting,  and  you  drive  ladies,'* 
Diana  replied. 

"  I  hope  I  know  one,  never  mind  the  hour,"  said  he  of 
the  capes. 

He  was  bidden  to  drive  rapidly. 

"  Complexion  a  tulip :  you  do  not  often  see  a  pale  cab- 
man," she  remarked  to  Dan  vers,  who  began  laughing,  as 
she  always  expected  to  do  on  an  excursion  with  her 
mistress. 

"  Do  you  remember,  ma'am,  the  cabman  taking  us  to  the 
coach,  when  you  thought  of  going  to  the  continent?  " 

"  And  I  went  to  The  Crossways  ?  I  have  forgotten 
him." 

"  He  declared  you  was  so  beautiful  a  lady  he  would  drive 
you  to  the  end  of  England  for  nothing." 

"  It  must  have  been  when  I  was  paying  him.  Put  it  out 
of  your  mind,  Danvers,  that  there  are  individual  cabmen. 
They  are  the  painted  flowers  of  our  metropolitan  thorough- 
fares, and  we  gather  them  in  rows." 

*' They  have  their  feelings,  ma'am." 

"  Brandied  feelings  are  not  pathetic  to  me." 

"  I  like  to  think  kindly  of  them,"  Danvers  remarked,  in 
reproof  of  her  inhumanit}'- ;  adding :  *'  They  may  overturn 
us  !  "  at  which  Diana  laughed. 

Her  eyes  were  drawn  to  a  brawl  of  women  and  men  in 
the  street.  "  Ah  !  that  miserable  sight !  "  she  cried.  "  It 
is  the  everlasting  nightmare  of  London." 

Danvers  humped,  femininely  injured  by  the  notice  of  it. 
She  wondered  her  mistress  should  deign  to. 

Rolling  on  between  the  blind  and  darkened  houses, 
Diana  transferred  her  sensations  to  them,  and  in  a  fit  of 
the  nerves  imagined  them  beholding  a  funeral  convoy  with- 
out followers. 


814  DIAKA  OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

They  came  in  view  of  the  domed  cathedral,  hearing,  in 
a  pause  of  the  wheels,  the  bell  of  the  hour.  "  Faster ! 
faster !  my  dear  man,"  Diana  murmured,  and  they  entered 
a  small  still  square  of  many  lighted  windows. 

"  This  must  be  where  the  morrow  is  manufactured," 
she  said.  "Tell  the  man  to  wait. —  Or  rather  it's  the 
mirror  of  yesterday :  we  have  to  look  backward  to  see 
forward  in  life." 

She  talked  her  cool  philosophy  to  mask  her  excitement 
from  herself. 

Her  card,  marked  :  "  Imperative  —  two  minutes"  was 
taken  up  to  Mr.  Tonans.  They  ascended  to  the  editorial 
ante-room.  Doors  opened  and  shut,  hasty  feet  traversed 
the  corridors,  a  dull  hum  in  dumbness  told  of  mighty 
business  at  work.  Diana  received  the  summons  to  the 
mighty  head  of  the  establishment.  Danvers  was  left  to 
speculate.  She  heard  the  voice  of  Mr.  Tonans:  "Not 
more  than  two  !  "  This  was  not  a  place  for  compliments. 
Men  passed  her,  hither  and  yonder,  cursorily  noticing  the 
presence  of  a  woman.  She  lost,  very  strangely  to  her, 
the  sense  of  her  sex  and  became  an  object  —  a  disregarded 
object.  Things  of  more  importance  were  about.  Her 
feminine  self-esteem  was  troubled  ;  all  idea  of  attractiveness 
expired.  Here  was  manifestly  a  spot  where  women  had 
dropped  from  the  secondary  to  the  cancelled  stage  of  their 
extraordinary  career  in  a  world  either  blowing  them  aloft 
like  soap-bubbles  or  quietly  shelving  them  as  supernu- 
meraries. A  gentleman  —  sweet  vision  I  —  shot  by  to 
the  editor's  door,  without  even  looking  cursorily.  He 
knocked.  Mr.  Tonans  appeared  and  took  him  by  the  arm, 
dictating  at  a  great  rate  ;  perceived  Danvers,  frowned  at 
the  female,  and  requested  him  to  wait  in  the  room,  which 
the  gentleman  did,  not  once  casting  eye  upon  a  woman. 
At  last  her  mistress  returned  to  her,  escorted  so  far  by 
Mr.  Tonans,  and  he  refreshingly  beut  his  back  to  bow  over 
her  hand :  so  we  have  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that  we 
are  not  such  poor  creatures  after  all !  Suffering  in  person, 
Danvers  was  revived  by  the  little  show  of  homage  to  her 
sex. 

They  descended  the  stairs. 

"  You  are  not  an  Editor  of  a  paper,  but  you  may  boast 


THE  SPRINGING  OF  A  MINE  315 

that  you  have  been  near  the  nest  of  one,"  Diana  said, 
when  they  resumed  their  seats  in  the  cab.  She  breathed 
deeply  from  time  to  time,  as  if  under  a  weight,  or  relieved 
of  it,  but  she  seemed  animated,  and  she  dropped  now  and 
jigain  a  funny  observation  or  the  kind  that  tickled  Danvers 
and  caused  the  maid  to  boast  of  her  everywhere  as  better 
^han  a  Play. 

At  home,  Danvers  busied  her  hands  to  supply  her  mis- 
tress a  cup  of  refreshing  tea  and  a  plate  of  biscuits.  Diana 
had  stunned  herself  with  the  strange  weight  of  the  expedi- 
tion, and  had  not  a  thought.  In  spite  of  tea  at  that  hour, 
she  slept  soundly  through  the  remainder  of  the  night, 
dreamlessly  till  late  into  the  morning. 


CHAPTER   XXXIII 

EXHIBITS   THE   SPRINGING  OF    A   MINE  IN  A  NEWSPAPER 

ARTICLE 

The  powers  of  harmony  would  seem  to  be  tried  to  their 
shrewdest  pitch  when  Politics  and  Love  are  planted  together 
in  a  human  breast.  This  apparently  opposite  couple  can 
nevertheless  chant  a  very  sweet  accord,  as  was  shown  by 
Dacier  on  his  homeward  walk  from  Diana's  house.  Let 
Love  lead,  the  God  will  make  music  of  any  chamber-com- 
rade. He  was  able  to  think  of  affairs  of  State  while  feel- 
ing the  satisfied  thirst  of  the  lover  whose  pride,  irritated 
by  confidential  wild  eulogies  of  the  beautiful  woman,  had 
recently  clamoured  for  proofs  of  his  commandership.  The 
impression  she  stamped  on  him  at  Copsley  remained,  but 
it  could  not  occupy  the  foreground  for  ever.  He  did  not 
object  to  play  second  to  her  sprightly  wits  in  converse,  if 
he  had  some  warm  testimony  to  his  mastery  over  her 
blood.  For  the  world  had  given  her  to  him,  enthusiastic 
friends  had  congratulated  him  :  she  had  exalted  him  for 
true  knightliness  ;  and  he  considered  the  proofs  well  earned, 
though  he  did  not  value  them  low.  They  were  little  by 
comparison.  They  lighted,  instead  of  staining,  her  unpar- 
alleled high  character. 


316  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

She  loved  him.  Full  surely  did  she  love  him,  or  such 
a  woman  would  never  have  consented  to  brave  the  world ; 
once  in  their  project  of  flight,  and  next,  even  more  endear- 
ingly when  contemplated,  in  the  sacrifice  of  her  good  name ; 
not  omitting  that  fervent  memory  of  her  pained  submission, 
but  a  palpitating  submission,  to  his  caress.  She  was  in  his 
arms  again  at  the  thought  of  it.  He  had  melted  her,  and 
won  the  confession  of  her  senses  by  a  surprise,  and  he 
owned  that  never  had  woman  been  so  vigilantly  self- 
guarded  or  so  watchful  to  keep  her  lover  amused  and 
aloof.  Such  a  woman  deserved  long  service.  But  then 
the  long  service  deserved  its  time  of  harvest.  Her  surging 
look  of  reproach  in  submission  pointed  to  the  golden  time, 
and  as  he  was  a  man  of  honour,  pledged  to  her  for  life,  he 
had  no  remorse,  and  no  scruple  in  determining  to  exact  her 
dated  promise,  on  this  occasion  deliberately.  She  was  the 
woman  to  be  his  wife  ;  she  was  his  mind's  mate  :  they  had 
hung  apart  in  deference  to  mere  scruples  too  long.  During 
the  fierce  battle  of  the  Session  she  would  be  his  help,  his 
fountain  of  counsel ;  and  she  would  be  the  rosy  gauze-veiled 
more  than  cold  helper  and  adviser,  the  being  which  would 
spur  her  womanly  intelligence  to  acknowledge,  on  this 
occasion  deliberately,  the  wisdom  of  the  step.  They  had 
been  so  close  to  it !  She  might  call  it  madness  then  :  now 
it  was  wisdom.  Each  had  complete  experience  of  the  other, 
and  each  vowed  the  step  must  be  taken. 

As  to  the  secret  communicated,  he  exulted  in  the  pardon- 
able cunning  of  the  impulse  turning  him  back  to  her  house 
after  the  guests  had  gone,  and  the  dexterous  play  of  his 
bait  on  the  line,  tempting  her  to  guess  and  quit  her  queenly 
guard.  Though  it  had  not  been  distinctly  schemed,  the 
review  of  it  in  that  light  added  to  the  enjoyment.  It  had 
been  dimly  and  richly  conjectured  as  a  hoped  result.  Small 
favours  from  her  were  really  worth,  thrice  worth,  the 
utmost  from  other  women.  They  tasted  the  sweeter  for 
the  winning  of  them  artfully  —  an  honourable  thing  in 
love.  Nature,  rewarding  the  lover's  ingenuity  and  enter- 
prise, inspires  him  with  old  Greek  notions  of  right  and 
wrong  :  and  love  is  indeed  a  fluid  mercurial  realm,  continu- 
ally shifting  the  principles  of  rectitude  and  larceny.     As 


THE  SPRINGING   OF  A   JVCGSTE  817 

long  as  he  means  nobly,  what  is  there  to  condemn  him  ? 
Not  she  in  her  heart.     She  was  the  presiding  divinity. 

And  she,  his  Tony,  that  splendid  Diana,  was  the  woman 
the  world  abused !     Whom  will  it  not  abuse  ? 

The  slough  she  would  have  to  plunge  in  before  he  could 
make  her  his  own  with  the  world's  consent,  was  already  up 
to  her  throat.  She  must,  and  without  further  hesitation, 
be  steeped,  that  he  might  drag  her  out,  washed  of  the 
imputed  defilement,  and  radiant,  as  she  was  in  character. 
Reflection  now  said  this  ;  not  impulse. 

Her  words  rang  through  him.  At  every  meeting  she  said 
things  to  confound  his  estimate  of  the  wits  of  women,  or  be 
remembered  for  some  spirited  ring  they  had :  —  A  high 
tvind  will  make  a  dead  leaf  fly  like  a  bird.  He  murmured 
it  and  flew  with  her.  She  quickened  a  vein  of  imagination 
that  gave  him  entrance  to  a  strangely  brilliant  sphere,  above 
his  own,  where,  she  sustaining,  he  too  could  soar ;  and  he 
did,  scarce  conscious  of  walking  home,  undressing,  falling 
asleep. 

The  act  of  waking  was  an  instantaneous  recovery  of  his 
emotional  rapture  of  the  overnight ;  nor  was  it  a  bar  to 
graver  considerations.  His  Chief  had  gone  down  to  a 
house  in  the  country ;  his  personal  business  was  to  see  and 
sound  the  followers  of  their  party  —  after  another  sight  of 
his  Tony.  She  would  be  sure  to  counsel  sagaciously ;  she 
always  did.  She  had  a  marvellous  intuition  of  the  natures 
of  the  men  he  worked  with,  solely  from  his  chance  descrip- 
tions of  them  :  it  was  as  though  he  started  the  bird  and  she 
transfixed  it.  And  she  should  not  have  matter  to  ruflle  her 
smooth  brows  :  that  he  swore  to.  She  should  sway  him  as 
she  pleased,  be  respected  after  her  prescribed  manner.  The 
promise  must  be  exacted;  nothing  besides  the  promise. — 
You  see,  Tony,  you  cannot  be  less  than  Tony  to  me  now, 
he  addressed  the  gentle  phantom  of  her.  Let  me  have  your 
word,  and  I  am  your  servant  till  the  Session  ends.  —  Tony 
blushes  her  swarthy  crimson  :  Diana,  fluttering,  rebukes  her ; 
but  Diana  is  the  appeasable  Goddess ;  Tony  is  the  woman, 
and  she  loves  him.  The  glorious  Goddess  need  not  cut  them 
adrift ;  they  can  show  her  a  book  of  honest  pages. 

Dacier  could  truthfully  say  he  had  worshipped,  done 
knightly   service   to   the   beloved   woman,  homage  to  the 


318  DIANA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

aui-eole  encircling  her.  Those  friends  of  his,  covertly 
congratulating  him  on  her  preference,  doubtless  thought 
him  more  privileged  than  he  was ;  but  they  did  not  know 
Diana ;  and  they  were  welcome,  if  they  would  only  believe, 
to  the  knowledge  that  he  was  at  the  feet  of  this  most  sover- 
eign woman.  He  despised  the  particular  Satyr-world  which, 
whatever  the  nature  or  station  of  the  woman,  crowns  the 
desecrator,  and  bestows  the  title  of  Fool  on  the  worshipper. 
He  could  have  answered  veraciously  that  she  had  kept  him 
from  folly. 

Nevertheless  the  term  to  service  must  come.  In  the 
assurance  of  the  approaching  term  he  stood  braced  against 
a  blowing  world ;  happy  as  men  are  when  their  muscles  are 
strung  for  a  prize  they  pluck  with  the  energy  and  aim  of 
their  whole  force. 

Letters  and  morning  papers  were  laid  for  him  to  peruse 
in  his  dressing-room.  He  read  his  letters  before  the  bath. 
Not  much  public  news  was  expected  at  the  present  season. 
While  dressing,  he  turned  over  the  sheets  of  Whitmonby*s 
journal.  Dull  comments  on  stale  tidings.  Foreign  news. 
Home  news,  with  the  leaders  on  them,  identically  dull. 
Behold  the  effect  of  Journalism  :  a  witty  man,  sparkling 
overnight,  gets  into  his  pulpit  and  proses ;  because  he  must 
say  something,  and  he  really  knows  nothing.  Journalists 
have  an  excessive  overestimate  of  their  influence.  They 
cannot,  as  Diana  said,  comparing  them  with  men  on  the 
Parliamentary  platform,  cannot  feel  they  are  aboard  the 
big  vessel ;  they  can  only  strive  to  raise  a  breeze,  or  find 
one  to  swell ;  and  they  cannot  measure  the  stoutness  or  the 
greatness  of  the  good  ship  England.  Dacier's  personal 
ambition  was  inferior  to  his  desire  to  extend  and  strengthen 
his  England.  Parliament  was  the  field,  Government  the 
office.  How  many  conversations  had  passed  between  him 
and  Diana  on  that  patriotic  dream  !  She  had  often  filled 
his  drooping  sails ;  he  owned  it  proudly  :  —  and  while  the 
world,  both  the  hoofed  and  the  rectilinear  portions,  were 
biting  at  her  character  !  Had  he  fretted  her  self-respect  ? 
He  blamed  himself,  but  a  devoted  service  must  have  its 
term. 

The  paper  of  Mr.  Tonans  was  reserved  for  perusal  at 
breakfast.     He  reserved  it  because  Tonans  was  an  opponent, 


THE   SPRINGING   OF   A  MINE  319 

tricksy  and  surprising  now  and  then,  amusing  too ;  unlikely 
to  afford  him  serious  reflections.  The  recent  endeavours  of 
his  journal  to  whip  the  Government-team  to  a  right-about- 
face  were  annoying,  preposterous.  Dacier  had  admitted 
to  Diana  that  Tonans  merited  the  thanks  of  the  country 
during  the  discreditable  Railway  mania,  when  his  articles 
had  a  fine  exhortative  and  prophetic  twang,  and  had  done 
marked  good.  Otherwise,  as  regarded  the  Ministry,  the 
veering  gusts  of  Tonans  were  objectionable  :  he  "raised  the 
breeze "  wantonly  as  well  as  disagreeably.  Anyone  can 
whip  up  the  populace  if  he  has  the  instruments ;  and 
Tonans  frequently  intruded  on  the  Ministry's  prerogative 
to  govern.  The  journalist  was  bidding  against  the  states- 
man. But  such  is  the  condition  of  a  rapidly  Radicalizing 
country  !     We  must  take  it  as  it  is. 

With  a  complacent.  What  now,  Dacier  fixed  his  indifferent 
eyes  on  the  first  column  of  the  leaders. 

He  read,  and  his  eyes  grew  horny.  He  jerked  back  at 
each  sentence,  electrified,  staring.  The  article  was  shorter 
than  usual.  Total  Repeal  was  named;  the  precise  date 
•when  the  Minister  intended  calling  Parliament  together  to 
propose  it.  The  "  Total  Repeal  "  might  be  guess-work  —  -i 
an  editor's  bold  stroke :  but  the  details,  the  date,  were 
significant  of  positive  information.  The  Minister's  definite 
and  immediate  instructions  were  exactly  stated. 

Where  could  the  fellow  have  got  hold  of  that  ?  Dacier 
asked  the  blank  ceiling. 

He  frowned  at  vacant  corners  of  the  room  in  an  effort  to 
conjure  some  speculation  indicative  of  the  source. 

Had  his  Chief  confided  the  secret  to  another  and  a 
traitor?  Had  they  been  overheard  in  his  library  when 
the  project  determined  on  was  put  in  plain  speech  ? 

The  answer  was  no,  impossible,  to  each  question. 

He  glanced  at  Diana.  She  ?  But  it  was  past  midnight 
when  he  left  her.  And  she  would  never  have  betrayed 
him,  never,  never.  To  imagine  it  a  moment  was  an 
injury  to  her. 

^  Wliere  else  could  he  look  ?  It  had  been  specially  men- 
tioned in  the  communication  as  a  secret  by  his  Chief,  who 
trusted  him  and  no  others.  Up  to  the  consultation  with 
the  Cabinet,  it  was  a  thing  to  be  guarded  like  life  itself. 


320  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

Xot  to  a  soul  except  Diana  would  Dacier  have  breathed 
syllable  of  any  secret  —  and  one  of  this  weight  I 

He  ran  down  the  article  again.  There  were  the  facts ; 
undeniable  facts ;  and  they  detonated  with  audible  roaring 
and  rounding  echoes  of  them  over  England.  How  did  they 
come  there  ?  As  well  inquire  how  man  came  on  the  face  of 
the  earth. 

He  had  to  wipe  his  forehead  perpetually.  Think  as  he 
would  in  exaltation  of  Diana  to  shelter  himself,  he  was  the 
accused.  He  might  not  be  the  guilty,  but  he  had  opened  his 
mouth ;  and  though  it  was  to  her  only,  and  she,  as  Dunstane 
had  sworn,  true  as  steel,  he  could  not  escape  condemnation. 
He  had  virtually  betrayed  his  master.  Diana  would  never 
betray  her  lover,  but  the  thing  was  in  the  air  as  soon  as 
uttered  :  and  off  to  the  printing-press  !  Dacier's  grotesque 
fancy  under  annoyance  pictured  a  stream  of  small  printer's 
devils  in  flight  from  his  babbling  lips. 

He  consumed  bits  of  breakfast,  with  a  sour  confession  that 
a  newspaper-article  had  hit  him  at  last,  and  stunningly. 

Hat  and  coat  were  called  for.  The  state  of  aimlessness 
in  hot  perplexity  demands  a  show  of  action.  Whither  to  go 
first  was  as  obscure  as  what  to  do.  Diana  said  of  the 
Englishman's  hat  and  coat,  that  she  supposed  they  were  to 
make  him  a  walking  presentment  of  the  house  he  had  shut 
up  behind  him.  A  shot  of  the  eye  at  the  glass  confirmed 
the  likeness,  but  with  a  ruefully  wry-faced  repudiation  of 
it  internally:  —  Not  so  shut  up!  the  reverse  of  that  —  a 
common  babbler. 

However,  there  was  no  doubt  of  Diana.  First  he  would 
call  on  her.  The  pleasantest  dose  in  perturbations  of  the 
kind  is  instinctively  taken  first.  She  would  console, 
perhaps  direct  him  to  guess  how  the  secret  had  leaked. — 
But  so  suddenly,  immediately  !     It  was  inexplicable. 

Sudden  and  immediate  consequences  were  experienced. 
On  the  steps  of  his  house  his  way  was  blocked  by  the  arri- 
val of  Mr.  Quintin  Manx,  who  jumped  out  of  a  cab, 
bellowing  interjections  and  interrogations  in  a  breath.  Was 
there  anything  in  that  article  ?  He  had  read  it  at  break- 
fast, and  it  had  choked  him.  Dacier  was  due  at  a  house 
and  could  not  wait :  he  said,  rather  sharply,  he  was  not 
responsible  for  newspaper  articles.     Quintin  Manx,  a  senior 


THE  criminal's   JUDGE  LOVE's  CRIMINAL        321 

gentleman  and  junior  landowner,  vowed  that  no  Minister 
intending  to  sell  the  country  should  treat  him  as  a  sheep. 
The  shepherd  might  go;  he  would  not  carry  his  flock  with 
him.  But  was  there  a  twinkle  of  probability  in  the  story  ? 
.  .  .  that  article  !  Dacier  was  unable  to  inform  him  ;  he  was 
very  hurried,  had  to  keep  an  appointment. 

"  If  I  let  you  go,  will  you  come  and  lunch  with  me  at 
two  ?  "  said  Quintin. 

To  get  rid  of  him,  Dacier  nodded  and  agreed. 

*'Two  o'clock,  mind!"  was  bawled  at  his  heels  as  he 
walked  off  with  his  long  stride,  unceremoniously  leaving 
the  pursy  gentleman  of  sixty  to  settle  with  his  cabman  far 
to  the  rear. 


CHAPTER  XXXIV 


IN  WHICH  IT  IS  DARKLY  SEEN  HOW  THE  CRIMINAL'S  JUDGE 
MAY  BE  love's  CRIMINAL 

When  we  are  losing  balance  on  a  precipice  we  do  not 
think  much  of  the  thing  we  have  clutched  for  support. 
Our  balance  is  restored  and  we  have  not  fallen ;  that  is  the 
comfortable  reflection :  we  stand  as  others  do,  and  we  will 
for  the  future  be  warned  to  avoid  the  dizzy  stations  which 
cry  for  resources  beyond  a  common  equilibrium,  and  where 
a  slip  precipitates  us  to  ruin. 

When,  further,  it  is  a  woman  planted  in  a  burning  blush, 
having  to  idealize  her  feminine  weakness,  that  she  may  not 
rebuke  herself  for  grovelling,  the  mean  material  acts  by 
which  she  sustains  a  tottering  position  are  speedily  swal- 
lowed in  the  one  pervading  flame.  She  sees  but  an  ashen 
curl  of  the  path  she  has  traversed  to  safety,  if  anything. 

Knowing  her  lover  was  to  come  in  the  morning,  Diana's 
thoughts  dwelt  wholly  upon  the  way  to  tell  him,  as  tenderly 
as  possible  without  danger  to  herself,  that  her  time  for  enter- 
tainingwas  over  until  she  had  finished  her  book  ;  indefinitely, 
therefore.  The  apprehension  of  his  complaining  pricked 
the  memory  that  she  had  something  to  forgive.  He  had 
sunk  her  in  her  own  esteem  by  compelling  her  to  see  her 

21 


322  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

woman's  softness.  But  how  high  above  all  other  men  her 
experience  of  him  could  place  him  notwithstanding  !  He 
had  bowed  to  the  figure  of  herself,  dearer  than  herself,  that 
she  set  before  him :  and  it  was  a  true  figure  to  the  world ; 
a  too  fictitious  to  any  but  the  most  knightly  of  lovers.  She 
forgave ;  and  a  shudder  seized  her.  —  Snake  !  she  rebuked 
the  delicious  run  of  fire  through  her  veins ;  for  she  was  not 
like  the  idol  women  of  imperishable  type,  who  are  never 
for  a  twinkle  the  prey  of  the  blood :  statues  created  by 
man's  common  desire  to  impress  upon  the  sex  his  possess- 
ing pattern  of  them  as  domestic  decorations. 

When  she  entered  the  room  to  Dacier  and  they  touched 
hands,  she  rejoiced  in  her  coolness,  without  any  other  feel- 
ing or  perception  active.  Not  to  be  unkind,  not  too  kind : 
this  was  her  task.  She  waited  for  the  passage  of  common- 
places. 

*'  You  slept  well,  Percy  ?  " 

**  Yes  ;  and  you  ?  " 

"I  don't  think  I  even  dreamed." 

They  sat.  She  noticed  the  cloud  on  him  and  waited  for 
his  allusion  to  it,  anxious  concerning  him  simply. 

Dacier  flung  the  hair  off  bis  temples.  Words  of  Titanic 
formation  were  hurling  in  his  head  at  journals  and  journal- 
ists.    He  muttered  his  disgust  at  them. 

"Is  there  anything  to  annoy  you  in  the  papers  to-day?  " 
she  asked,  and  thought  how  handsome  his  face  was  in  anger. 

The  paper  of  Mr.  Tonans  was  named  by  him.  *^You 
have  not  seen  it  ?  " 

"  I  have  not  opened  it  yet." 

He  sprang  up.  "  The  truth  is,  those  fellows  can  now  af- 
ford to  buy  right  and  left,  corrupt  every  soul  alive !  There 
must  have  been  a  spy  at  the  keyhole.  I  'm  pretty  certain 
—  I  could  swear  it  was  not  breathed  to  any  ear  but  mine ; 
and  there  it  is  this  morning  in  black  and  white." 

"  What  is  ?  "  cried  Diana,  turning  to  him  on  her  chair. 

"  The  thing  I  told  you  last  night." 

Her  lips  worked,  as  if  to  spell  the  thing.  "  Printed,  do 
you  say  ?  "  she  rose. 

"  Printed.  In  a  leading  article,  loud  as  a  trumpet ;  a  hue 
and  cry  running  from  end  to  end  of  the  country.  And  my 
Chief  has  already  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  the  secret 


THE  CKBIINAL's   JUDGE  LOVE's   CRIMINAL        323 

he  confided  to  me  yesterday  roared  in  all  the  thoroughfares 
this  morning.  They've  got  the  facts:  his  decision  to  pro- 
pose it,  and  tlie  date  —  the  whole  of  it !  But  who  could 
have  betrayed  it  ?  " 

For  the  first  time  since  her  midnight  expedition  she  felt 
a  sensation  of  the  full  weight  of  the  deed.  She  heard 
thunder. 

She  tried  to  disperse  the  growing  burden  by  an  inward 
summons  to  contempt  of  the  journalistic  profession,  but 
nothing  would  come.  She  tried  to  minimize  it,  and  her 
brain  succumbed.  Her  views  of  the  deed  last  night  and  now 
throttled  reason  in  two  contending  clutches.  The  enormity 
swelled  its  dimensions,  taking  shape,  and  pointing  magneti- 
cally at  her.  She  stood  absolutely,  amazedly,  bare  before 
it. 

^^  Is  it  of  such  very  great  importance  ? "  she  said,  like 
one  supplicating  him  to  lessen  it. 

^'  A  secret  of  State  ?  If  you  ask  whether  it  is  of  great 
importance  to  me,  relatively  it  is  of  course.  Nothing 
greater.  Personally  my  conscience  is  clear.  I  never  men- 
tioned it —  couldn't  have  mentioned  it  —  to  any  one  but 
you.  I  'm  not  the  man  to  blab  secrets.  He  spoke  to  me 
because  he  knew  he  could  trust  me.  To  tell  you  the  truth, 
I  'm  brought  to  a  dead  stop.  I  can't  make  a  guess.  I  'm 
certain,  from  what  he  said,  that  he  trusted  me  only  with  it : 
perfectly  certain.  I  know  him  well.  He  was  in  his  library, 
speaking  in  his  usual  conversational  tone,  deliberately,  not 
overloud.     He  stated  that  it  was  a  secret  between  us." 

'^ Will  it  affect  him?" 

*'  This  article  ?  Why,  naturally  it  will.  You  ask  strange 
questions.  A  Minister  coming  to  a  determination  like 
that!  It  affects  him  vitally.  The  members  of  the  Cabinet 
are  not  so  devoted.  ...  It  affects  us  all  —  the  whole 
Party  ;  may  split  it  to  pieces !  There  's  no  reckoning  the 
upset  right  and  left.  If  it  were  false,  it  could  be  refuted  ; 
we  could  despise  it  as  a  trick  of  journalism.  It 's  true. 
There  's  the  mischief.  Tonans  did  not  happen  to  call  here 
last  night  ? —  absurd  !     I  left  later  than  twelve." 

"No,  but  let  me  hear,"  Diana  said  hurriedly,  for  the  sake 
of  uttering  the  veracious  negative  and  to  slur  it  over. 
**  Let  me  hear  .  .  ."     She  could  not  muster  an  idea. 


324  DIANA   OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

Her  delicious  thrilling  voice  was  a  comfort  to  him.  He 
lifted  his  breast  high  and  thumped  it,  trying  to  smile. 
"  After  all,  it 's  pleasant  being  with  you,  Tony.  Give  rae 
your  hand  —  you  may  :  I  'm  bothered  —  confounded  by  this 
morning  surprise.  It  was  like  walking  against  the  muzzle 
of  a  loaded  cannon  suddenly  unmasked.  One  can't  fathom 
the  mischief  it  will  do.  And  I  shall  be  suspected,  and  can't 
quite  protest  myself  the  spotless  innocent.  Not  even  to 
one's  heart's  mistress  !  to  the  wife  of  the  bosom !  I  sup- 
pose I'm  no  Koman.  You  won't  give  me  your  hand? 
Tony,  you  might,  seeing  I  am  rather  .  .  ." 

A  rush  of  scalding  tears  flooded  her  eyes. 

"  Don't  touch  me,"  she  said,  and  forced  her  sight  to  look 
straight  at  him  through  the  fiery  shower.  "  I  have  done 
positive  inischief?  " 

"You,  my  dear  Tony?"  He  doated  on  her  face.  "I 
don't  blame  you,  I  blame  myself.  These  things  should 
never  be  breathed.  Once  in  the  air,  the  devil  has  hold  of 
them.  Don't  take  it  so  much  to  heart.  The  thing's  bad 
enough  to  bear  as  it  is.  Tears !  Let  me  have  the  hand. 
I  came,  on  my  honour,  with  the  most  honest  intention  to 
submit  to  your  orders :  but  if  I  see  you  weeping  in  sym- 
pathy ! " 

"Oh!  for  heaven's  sake,"  she  caught  her  hands  away 
from  him,  "  don't  be  generous.  Whip  me  with  scorpions. 
And  don't  touch  me,"  cried  Diana.  "  Do  you  understand  ? 
You  did  not  name  it  as  a  secret.  I  did  not  imagine  it  to  be 
a  secret  of  immense,  immediate  importance." 

a  But  —  what  ?  "  shouted  Dacier  stiffening. 

He  wanted  her  positive  meaning,  as  she  perceived,  having 
hoped  that  it  was  generally  taken  and  current,  and  the 
shock  to  him  over. 

'^  I  had  ...  I  had  not  a  suspicion  of  doing  harm,  Percy." 

"  But  what  harm  have  you  done  ?     No  riddles !  " 

His  features  gave  sign  of  the  break  in  their  common 
ground,  the  widening  gulf. 

"  I  went  ...  it  was  a  curious  giddiness  :  I  can't  account 
for  it.     I  thought  .  .  ." 

"  Went  ?     You  went  where  ?  " 

"  Last  night.  I  would  speak  intelligibly :  my  mind  has 
gone.     Ah !  you  look.     It  is  not  so  bad  as  my  feeling." 


THE   criminal's   JUDGE  LOVE'S   CRIMINAL        325 

"  But  where  did  you  go  last  night  ?  What !  —  to 
Tonans  ? '' 

She  drooped  her  head :  she  saw  the  track  of  her  route 
cleaving  the  darkness  in  a  demoniacal  zig-zag  and  herself 
in  demon's  grip. 

"  Yes,"  she  confronted  him.     "  I  went  to  Mr.  Tonans." 

"  Why  ?  " 

'^  I  went  to  him  — " 

"  You  went  alone  ?  " 

^•'  I  took  my  maid." 

a  Well  ?  " 

"  It  was  late  when  you  left  me  ..." 

"Speak  plainly! " 

"  I  am  trying  :  I  will  tell  you  all." 

"  At  once,  if  you  please." 

"  I  went  to  him  —  why  ?  There  is  no  accounting  for  it. 
He  sneered  constantly  at  any  stale  information." 

"  You  gave  him  constant  information  ?  " 

"  No :  in  our  ordinary  talk.  He  railed  at  me  for  being 
*  out  of  it.'  I  must  be  childish  :  I  went  to  show  him  —  oh ! 
my  vanity  !     I  think  I  must  have  been  possessed." 

She  watched  the  hardening  of  her  lover's  eyes.  They 
penetrated,  and  through  them  she  read  herself  insufferably. 

But  it  was  with  hesitation  still  that  he  said  :  "  Then  you 
betrayed  me  ?  " 

"  Percy !     I  had  not  a  suspicion  of  mischief." 

*^  You  went  straight  to  this  man  ?  " 

"  Not  thinking  ..." 

"  You  sold  me  to  a  journalist ! " 

"  I  thought  it  was  a  secret  of  a  day.  I  don't  think  you  — 
no,  you  did  not  tell  me  to  keep  it  secret.  A  word  from 
you  would  have  been  enough.     I  was  in  extremity." 

Dacier  threw  his  hands  up  and  broke  away.  He  had  an 
impulse  to  dash  from  the  room,  to  get  a  breath  of  different 
air.  He  stood  at  the  window,  observing  tradesmen's  carts, 
housemaids,  blank  doors,  dogs,  a  beggar  lifer.  Her  last 
words  recurred  to  him.  He  turned :  ''  You  were  in  ex- 
tremity, you  said.  What  is  the  meaning  of  that  ?  What 
extremity  ?  " 

Her  large  dark  eyes  flashed  powerlessly ;  her  shape 
appeared  to  have  narrowed ;  her  tongue,  too,  was  a  feeble 
penitent. 


326  DIAKA   OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

*^  You  ask  a  creature  to  recall  her  acts  of  insanity." 

"  There  must  be  some  signification  in  your  words,  I 
suppose." 

"  I  will  tell  you  as  clearly  as  I  can.  You  have  the  right 
to  be  my  judge.  I  was  in  extremity  —  that  is,  I  saw  no 
means  ...  I  could  not  write  :  it  was  ruin  coming." 

"  Ah  ?  —  you  took  payment  for  playing  spy  ?  " 

"  I  fancied  I  could  retrieve  .  .  .  Now  I  see  the  folly,  the 
baseness.     I  was  blind." 

*'  Then  you  sold  me  to  a  journalist  for  money  ?  " 

The  intolerable  scourge  fetched  a  stifled  scream  from  her 
and  drove  her  pacing,  but  there  was  no  escape  j  she  returned 
to  meet  it. 

The  room  was  a  cage  to  both  of  them,  and  every  word  of 
either  was  a  sting. 

"  Percy,  I  did  not  imagine  he  would  use  it  —  make  use  of 
it  as  he  has  done." 

"  Not  ?     And  when  he  paid  for  it  ?  " 

"I  fancied  it  would  be  merely  of  general  service  —  ii 
any." 

"  Distributed ;  I  see :  not  leading  to  the  exposure  of  the 
communicant ! " 

"  You  are  harsh ;  but  I  would  not  have  you  milder." 

The  meekness  of  such  a  mischief -doer  was  revolting  and 
called  for  the  lash. 

"  Do  me  the  favour  to  name  the  sum.  I  am  curious  to 
learn  what  my  imbecility  was  counted  worth." 

"  No  sum  was  named." 

"  Have  I  been  bought  for  a  song  ?  " 

"It  was  a  suggestion  —  no  definite  .  .  .  nothing  stipu- 
lated." 

"  You  were  to  receive  money  !  " 

"  Leave  me  a  bit  of  veiling  !  No,  you  shall  behold  me 
the  thing  I  am.     Listen  ...   I  was  poor  .  .  ." 

"  You  might  have  applied  to  me." 

"For  money  !    That  I  could  not  do." 

**  Better  than  betraying  me,  believe  me." 

"  I  had  no  thought  of  betraying.  I  hope  I  could  have 
died  rather  than  consciously  betray." 

*'  Money !     My  whole  fortune  was  at  your  disposal." 

"  I  was  beset  with  debts,  unable  to  write,  and,  last  night 


THE  CRI^nNAL'fc  JUDGE  LO\^'s   CEIMINAL       327 

when  you  left  me,  abject.    It  seemed  to  me  that  you  dis- 
respected me  .  .  ." 

"  Last  night !  "  Dacier  cried  with  lashing  emphasis. 

"  It  is  evident  to  me  that  I  have  the  reptile  in  me,  Percy.  ' 
Or  else  I  am  subject  to  lose  my  reason.     I  went  ...  I 
went  like  a  bullet :  I  cannot  describe  it ;  I  was  mad.     i  ! 
need  a  strong  arm,  I  want  help.     I  am  given  to  think  that 
I  do  my  best  and  can  be  independent;  I  break  down.     I  | 
went  blindly  —  now  I  see  it  —  for  the  chance  of  recovering 
my  position,  as  the  gambler  casts ;  and  he  wins  or  loses. 
With  me  it  is  the  soul  that  is  lost.     No  exact  sum  was 
named  ;  thousands  were  hinted.'' 

"  You  are  hardly  practical  on  points  of  business." 

"  I  was  insane." 

"I  think  you  said  you  slept  well  after  it,"  Dacier 
remarked. 

"  I  had  so  little  the  idea  of  having  done  evilly,  that  I 
slept  without  a  dream." 

He  shrugged :  —  the  consciences  of  women  are  such 
smooth  deeps,  or  running  shallows. 

"I  have  often  wondered  how  your  newspaper  men  got 
their  information,"  he  said,  and  muttered :  "  Money  — 
women !  "  adding :  "  Idiots  to  prime  them  !  And  I  one  of 
the  leaky  vessels  !  Well,  we  learn.  I  have  been  rather 
astonished  at  times  of  late  at  the  scraps  of  secret  knowl- 
edge displayed  by  Tonans.  If  he  flourishes  his  thousands ! 
The  wonder  is,  he  does  n't  corrupt  the  Ministers'  wives. 
Perhaps  he  does.  Marriage  will  become  a  danger-sign  to 
Parliamentary  members.  Foreign  women  do  these  tricks 
.  .  .  women  of  a  well-known  stamp.  It  is  now  a  full  year,  I 
think,  since  I  began  to  speak  to  you  of  secret  matters  —  and 
congratulated  myself,  I  recollect,  on  your  thirst  for  them." 

"Percy,  if  you  suspect  that  I  have  uttered  one  word 
before  last  night,  you  are  wrong.  I  cannot  paint  my  temp- 
tation or  my  loss  of  sense  last  night.  Previously  I  was 
blameless.  I  thirsted,  yes ;  but  in  the  hope  of  helping 
you." 

He  looked  at  her.  She  perceived  how  glitteringly  love- 
less his  eyes  had  grown.  It  was  her  punishment ;  and 
though  the  enamoured  woman's  heart  protested  it  exces- 
sive, she  accepted  it. 


828  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  I  can  never  trust  you  again,"  he  said. 

"  I  fear  you  will  not,"  she  replied. 

His  coming  back  to  her  after  the  departure  of  the  guests 
last  night  shone  on  him  in  splendid  colours  of  single- 
minded  loverlike  devotion.  "  I  came  to  speak  to  my  own 
heart.  I  thought  it  would  give  you  pleasure;  thought  I 
could  trust  you  utterly.  I  had  not  the  slightest  conception 
I  was  imperilling  my  honour  1  .  .  ." 

He  stopped.  Her  bloodless  fixed  features  revealed  an 
intensity  of  anguish  that  checked  him.  Only  her  mouth, 
a  little  open  for  the  sharp  breath,  appeared  dumbly  be- 
seeching. Her  large  eyes  met  his  like  steel  to  steel,  as  of 
one  who  would  die  fronting  the  weapon. 

He  strangled  a  loathsome  inclination  to  admire. 

"  So  good  bye,''  he  said. 

She  moved  her  lips. 

He  said  no  more.     In  half  a  minute  he  was  gone. 

To  her  it  was  the  plucking  of  life  out  of  her  breast. 

She  pressed  her  hands  where  heart  had  been.  The 
pallor  and  cold  of  death  took  her  body. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 


y  REVEALS     HOW    THE    TRUE    HEROINE      OP     ROMANCE     COMES 
FINALLY   TO    HER    TIME    OF    TRIUMPH 

The  shutting  of  her  house-door  closed  for  Dacier  that 
•woman's  history  in  connection  with  himself.  He  set  his 
mind  on  the  consequences  of  the  act  of  folly  —  the  trusting 
a  secret  to  a  woman.  All  were  possibly  not  so  bad :  none 
should  be  trusted. 

The  air  of  the  street  fanned  him  agreeably  as  he  revolved 
the  horrible  project  of  confession  to  the  man  who  had  put 
faith  in  him.  Particulars  might  be  asked.  She  would  be 
unnamed,  but  an  imagination  of  the  effect  of  naming  her 
placarded  a  notorious  woman  in  fresh  paint :  two  members 
of  the  same  family  her  victims  ! 

And  last  night,  no  later  than  last  night,  he  had  swung 
round  at  this  very  corner  of  the  street  to  give  her  the  full- 


THE  TKtTE  HEROINE*S  TIME  OF  TRIUMPH.        329 

est  proof  of  his  affection.  He  beheld  a  dupe  trotting  into 
a  carefully-laid  pitfall.  She  had  him  by  the  generosity  of 
his  confidence  in  her.  Moreover,  the  recollection  of  her 
recent  feeble  phrasing,  when  she  stood  convicted  of  the 
treachery,  when  a  really  clever  woman  would  have  de- 
veloped her  resources,  led  him  to  doubt  her  being  so  finely 
gifted.  She  was  just  clever  enough  to  hoodwink.  He 
attributed  the  dupery  to  a  trick  of  imposing  the  idea  of 
her  virtue  upon  men.  Attracted  by  her  good  looks  and 
sparkle,  they  entered  the  circle  of  her  charm,  became  de- 
lightfully intimate,  suffered  a  rebuff,  and  were  from  that 
time  prepared  to  serve  her  purpose.  How  many  other 
wretched  dupes  had  she  dangling  ?  He  spied  at  Westlake, 
spied  at  Red  worth,  at  old  Lord  Larrian,  at  Lord  Dannis- 
burgh,  at  Arthur  Ehodes,  dozens.  Old  and  young  were 
alike  to  her  if  she  saw  an  end  to  be  gained  by  keeping  them 
hooked.  Tonans  too,  and  Whitmonby.  Newspaper  editors 
were  especially  serviceable.  Perhaps  "  a  young  Minister  of 
State "  held  the  foremost  rank  in  that  respect :  if  com- 
pletely duped  and  squeezeable,  he  produced  more  sub- 
stantial stuff. 

The  background  of  ice  in  Dacier's  composition  was 
brought  to  the  front  by  his  righteous  contempt  of  her 
treachery.  No  explanation  of  it  would  have  appeased  him. 
She  was  guilty,  and  he  condemned  her.  She  stood  con- 
demned by  all  the  evil  likely  to  ensue  from  her  misdeed. 
Scarcely  had  he  left  her  house  last  night  when  she  was 
away  to  betray  him !  —  He  shook  her  from  him  without  a 
pang.  Crediting  her  with  the  one  merit  she  had —  that  of 
not  imploring  for  mercy  —  he  the  more  easily  shook  her 
off.  Treacherous,  she  had  not  proved  theatrical.  So  there 
was  no  fuss  in  putting  out  her  light,  and  it  was  done.  He 
was  justified  by  the  brute  facts.  Honourable,  courteous, 
kindly  gentleman,  highly  civilized,  an  excellent  citizen  and 
a  patriot,  he  was  icy  at  an  outrage  to  his  principles,  and  in 
the  dominion  of  Love  a  sultan  of  the  bow-string  and  chop- 
per period,  sovereignly  endowed  to  stretch  a  finger  for  the 
scimitared  Mesrour  to  make  the  erring  woman  head  and 
trunk  with  one  blow:  and  away  with  those  remnants! 
This  internally  he  did.  Enough  that  the  brute  facts  jus- 
tified him. 


830  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

St.  James's  park  was  crossed,  and  the  grass  of  the  Green 
park,  to  avoid  inquisitive  friends.  He  was  obliged  to  walk  ; 
exercise,  action  of  any  sort,  was  imperative,  and  but  for 
some  engagement  he  would  have  gone  to  his  fencing-rooms 
for  a  bout  with  the  master.  He  remembered  his  engage- 
ment and  grew  doubly  embittered.  He  had  absurdly 
pledged  himself  to  lunch  with  Quintin  Manx;  that  was, 
to  pretend  to  eat  while  submitting  to  be  questioned  by  a 
political  dullard  strong  on  his  present  right  to  overhaul  and 
rail  at  his  superiors.  The  house  was  one  of  a  block  along 
the  North-Western  line  of  Hyde  park.  He  kicked  at  the 
subjection  to  go  there,  but  a  promise  was  binding,  though 
he  gave  it  when  stunned.  He  could  have  silenced  Mr. 
Manx  with  the  posing  interrogation :  Why  have  I  so  long 
consented  to  put  myself  at  the  mercy  of  a  bore  ?  For  him, 
he  could  not  answer  it,  though  Manx,  as  leader  of  the  Ship- 
ping interest,  was  influential.  The  man  had  to  be  endured, 
like  other  doses  in  politics. 

Dacier  did  not  once  think  of  the  great  ship-owner's 
niece  till  Miss  Constance  Asper  stepped  into  her  drawing- 
room  to  welcome  him.  She  was  an  image  of  repose  to  his 
mind.  The  calm  pure  outline  of  her  white  features  re- 
freshed him  as  the  Alps  the  Londoner  newly  alighted  at 
Berne;  smoke,  wrangle,  the  wrestling  city's  wickedness, 
behind  him. 

'^  My  uncle  is  very  disturbed,"  she  said.  "  Is  the  news  — 
if  I  am  not  very  indiscreet  in  inquiring  ?  " 

"  I  have  a  practice  of  never  paying  attention  to  news- 
paper articles,"  Dacier  replied. 

"  I  am  only  affected  by  living  with  one  who  does,"  Miss 
Asper  observed,  and  the  lofty  isolation  of  her  head  above 
politics  gave  her  a  moral  attractiveness  in  addition  to  physi- 
cal beauty.  Her  water-colour  sketches  were  on  her  uncle's 
walls :  the  beautiful  in  nature  claimed  and  absorbed  her. 
She  dressed  with  a  pretty  rigour,  a  lovely  simplicity, 
picturesque  of  the  nunnery.  She  looked  indeed  a  high-born 
young  lady-abbess, 

"  It 's  a  dusty  game  for  ladies,"  Dacier  said,  abhorring  the 
women  defiled  by  it. 

And  when  one  thinks  of  the  desire  of  men  to  worship 
women,  there  is  a  pathos  in  a  man's  discovery  of  the  fair 


THE  TRUE   heroine's  TIME   OF  TRIUMPH         331 

young  creature  undefiled  by  any  interest  in  public  affairs, 
virginal  amid  her  bower's  environments. 

The  angelical  beauty  of  a  virgin  mind  and  person  capti- 
vated him,  by  contrast.  His  natural  taste  was  to  admire  it, 
shunning  the  lures  and  tangles  of  the  women  on  high  seas, 
notably  the  married  :  who,  by  the  way,  contrive  to  ensnare 
us  through  wonderment  at  a  cleverness  caught  from  their 
traffic  with  the  masculine  world  :  often  —  if  we  did  but 
know!  —  a  parrot  repetition  of  the  last  male  visitor's 
remarks.  But  that  which  the  fair  maiden  speaks,  though 
it  may  be  simple,  is  her  own. 

She  too  is  her  own :  or  vowed  but  to  one.  She  is  on  all 
sides  impressive  in  purity.  The  world  worships  her  as  its 
perfect  pearl :  and  we  are  brought  refreshfully  to  acknowl- 
edge that  the  world  is  right. 

By  contrast,  the  white  radiation  of  Innocence  distin- 
guished Constance  Asper  celestially.  As  he  was  well  aware, 
she  had  long  preferred  him  —  the  reserved  among  many 
pleading  pressing  suitors.  Her  steady  faithfulness  had  fed 
on  the  poorest  crumbs. 

He  ventured  to  express  the  hope  that  she  was  well. 

"Yes,"  she  answered,  with  eyelids  lifted  softly  to  thank 
him  for  his  concern  in  so  humble  a  person. 

''  You  look  a  little  pale,"  he  said. 

She  coloured  like  a  sea-water  shell.  "  I  am  inclined  to 
paleness  by  nature." 

Her  uncle  disturbed  them.  Lunch  was  ready.  He  apolo- 
gized for  the  absence  of  Mrs.  Markland,  a  maternal  aunt  of 
Constance,  who  kept  house  for  them.  Quintin  Manx  fell 
upon  the  meats,  and  then  upon  the  Minister.  Dacier  found 
himself  happily  surprised  by  the  accession  of  an  appetite. 
He  mentioned  it,  to  escape  from  the  worrying  of  his  host, 
as  unusual  with  him  at  midday  :  and  Miss  Asper,  support- 
ing him  in  that  effort,  said  benevolently  :  "  Gentlemen  should 
eat ;  they  have  so  many  fatigues  and  troubles."  She  her- 
self did  not  like  to  be  seen  eating  in  public.  Her  lips 
opened  to  the  morsels,  as  with  a  bird's  bill,  though  with 
none  of  the  pecking  eagerness  we  complacently  observe  in 
poultry. 

"  But  now,  I  say,  positively,  how  about  that  article  ?  *' 
said  Quintin. 


332  DIANA  OP  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

Dacier  visibly  winced,  and  Constance  immediately  said ; 
"  Oh  !  spare  us  politics,  dear  uncle." 

Her  intercession  was  without  avail,  but  by  contrast  with 
the  woman  implicated  in  the  horrible  article,  it  was  a  carol 
of  the  seraphs. 

"Come,  you  can  say  whether  there's  anything  in  it," 
Dacier's  host  pushed  him. 

^'  I  should  not  say  it  if  I  could,"  he  replied. 

The  mild  sweetness  of  Miss  Asper's  look  encouraged 
him. 

He  was  touched  to  the  quick  by  hearing  her  say :  "  You 
ask  for  Cabinet  secrets,  uncle.  All  secrets  are  holy,  but 
secrets  of  State  are  under  a  seal  next  to  divine." 

Next  to  divine!  She  was  the  mouthpiece  of  his  ruling 
principle. 

"  I  'm  not  prying  into  secrets,"  Quintin  persisted  ;  "  all  I 
want  to  know  is,  whether  there 's  any  foundation  for  that 
article  —  all  London  's  boiling  about  it,  I  can  tell  you  —  or 
it 's  only  newspaper's  humbug." 

"  Clearly  the  oracle  for  you  is  the  Editor 's  office," 
rejoined  Dacier. 

"  A  pretty  sort  of  answer  I  should  get." 

"  It  would  at  least  be  complimentary." 

"  How  do  you  mean  ?  " 

"  The  net  was  cast  for  you  —  and  the  sight  of  a  fish  in  it ! " 

Miss  Asper  almost  laughed.  "■  Have  you  heard  the  choir 
at  St.  Catherine 's  ?  "  she  asked. 

Dacier  had  not.  He  repented  of  his  worldliness,  and 
drinking  persuasive  claret,  said  he  would  go  to  hear  it  next 
Sunday. 

"  Do,"  she  murmured. 

'*  Well,  you  seem  to  be  a  pair  against  me,"  her  uncle 
grumbled.  "'  Anyhow  I  think  it 's  important.  People  have 
been  talking  for  some  time,  and  I  don't  want  to  be  taken 
unawares ;  I  won*t  be  a  yoked  ox,  mind  you." 

"  Have  you  been  sketching  lately  ?  "  Dacier  asked  Miss 
Asper. 

She  generally  filled  a  book  in  the  autumn,  she  said. 

"May  I  see  it?" 

**If  you  wish." 

They  had  a  short  tussle  with  her  uncle  and  escaped.    He 


THE  TRUE  heroine's   TIME   OF  TRIUIMPH         833 

was  conducted  to  a  room  midway  upstairs :  an  heiress's 
conception  of  a  saintly  little  room;  and  more  impressive  in 
purity,  indeed  it  was,  than  a  saint's,  with  the  many  cruci- 
fixes, gold  and  silver  emblems,  velvet  prie-Dieu  chairs, 
jewel-clasped  sacred  volumes  :  every  invitation  to  meditate 
in  luxury  on  an  ascetic  religiousness. 

She  depreciated  her  sketching  powers.  "I  am  impatient 
with  my  imperfections.  I  am  therefore  doomed  not  to 
advance." 

"  On  the  contrary,  that  is  the  state  guaranteeing  ultimate 
excellence,"  he  said,  much  disposed  to  drone  about  it. 

She  sighed :  '*  I  fear  not.'' 

He  turned  the  leaves,  comparing  her  modesty  with  the 
performance.  The  third  of  the  leaves  was  a  subject  in- 
stantly recognized  by  him.  It  represented  the  place  he  had 
inherited  from  Lord  Dannisburgh. 

He  named  it. 

She  smiled :  "  You  are  good  enough  to  see  a  likeness  ? 
My  aunt  and  I  were  passing  it  last  October,  and  I  waited 
for  a  day,  to  sketch." 

"  You  have  taken  it  from  my  favourite  point  of  view." 

''  I  am  glad." 

"  How  much  I  should  like  a  copy  I  " 

^'  If  you  will  accept  that  ?  " 

"  I  could  not  rob  you." 

"  I  can  make  a  duplicate." 

"  The  look  of  the  place  pleases  you  ?  " 

"  Oh !  yes  ;  the  pines  behind  it ;  the  sweet  little  village 
church ;  even  the  appearance  of  the  rustics  ;  —  it  is  all  im- 
pressively old  English.  I  suppose  you  are  very  seldom 
there  ? " 

"  Does  it  look  like  a  home  to  you  ?  " 

"  No  place  more ! " 

"  I  feel  the  loneliness." 

"  Where  I  live  I  feel  no  loneliness  !  " 

"  You  have  heavenly  messengers  near  you." 

"  They  do  not  always  come." 

"  Would  you  consent  to  make  the  place  less  lonely  to  me  ?  " 

Her  bosom  rose.  In  deference  to  her  maidenly  undei> 
standing,  she  gazed  inquiringly. 

''  If  you  love  it !  "  said  he. 


334  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  The  place  ?  *'  she  said,  looking  soft  at  the  possessor. 

"  Constance ! " 

''  Is  it  true  ?  " 

"As  you  yourself.  Could  it  be  other  than  true  ?  This 
hand  is  mine  ?  " 

"Oh!  Percy.'' 

Borrowing  the  world's  poetry  to  describe  them,  the  long 
prayed-for  Summer  enveloped  the  melting  snows. 

So  the  recollection  of  Diana's  watch  beside  his  uncle's 
death-bed  was  wiped  out.  Ay,  and  the  hissing  of  her 
treachery  silenced.  This  maidenly  hand  put  him  at  peace 
with  the  world,  instead  of  his  defying  it  for  a  worthless 
woman  —  who  could  not  do  better  than  accept  the  shelter  of 
her  husband 's  house,  as  she  ought  to  be  told,  if  her  friends 
wished  her  to  save  her  reputation. 

Dacier  made  his  way  downstairs  to  Quintin  Manx,  by 
whom  he  was  hotly  congratulated  and  informed  of  the 
extent  of  the  young  lady 's  fortune :  on  the  strength  of 
which  it  was  expected  that  he  would  certainly  speak  a  pri- 
vate word  in  elucidation  of  that  newspaper  article. 

"I  know  nothing  of  it,"  said  Dacier,  but  promised  to 
come  and  dine. 

Alone  in  her  happiness  Constance  Asper  despatched 
various  brief  notes  under  her  gold-symbolled  crest  to 
sisterly  friends ;  one  to  Lady  Wathin,  containing  the  single 
line :  — 

"Your  prophesy  is  confirmed." 

Dacier  was  comfortably  able  to  face  his  Club  after  the 
excitement  of  a  proposal,  with  a  bride  on  his  hands.  He 
was  assaulted  concerning  the  article,  and  he  parried  capi- 
tally. Say  that  her  lips  were  rather  cold :  at  any  rate, 
they  invigorated  him.  Her  character  was  guaranteed  — 
not  the  hazy  idea  of  a  dupe.  And  her  fortune  would  be 
enormous ;  a  speculation  merely  due  to  worldly  prudence 
and  prospective  ambition. 

At  the  dinner-table  of  four,  in  the  evening,  conversation 
would  have  seemed  dull  to  him,  by  contrast,  had  it  not  been 
for  the  presiding  grace  of  his  bride,  whose  habitually  emi- 
nent feminine  air  of  superiority  to  the  repast  was  throned  by 
her  appreciative  receptiveness  of  his  looks  and  utterances. 
Before  leaving  her,  he  won  her  consent  to  a  very  early  mar- 


THE  TRUE   heroine's   TIME   OP   TRIUMPH         335 

riage ;  on  the  plea  of  a  possibly  approaching  Session,  and  also 
that  they  had  waited  long.  The  consent,  notwithstanding 
the  hurry  of  preparations  it  involved,  besides  the  annihila- 
tion of  her  desire  to  meditate  on  so  solemn  a  change  in  her 
life  and  savour  the  congratulation  of  her  friends  and  have 
the  choir  of  St.  Catherine's  rigorously  drilled  in  her  favour- 
ite anthems,  was  beautifully  yielded  to  the  pressure  of 
circumstances. 

There  lay  on  his  table  at  night  a  letter ;  a  bulky  letter. 
No  need  to  tear  it  open  for  sight  of  the  signature  :  the 
superscription  was  redolent  of  that  betraying  woman.  He 
tossed  it  unopened  into  the  fire. 

As  it  was  thick,  it  burned  sullenly,  discolouring  his  name 
on  the  address,  as  she  had  done,  and  still  offering  him  a  last 
chance  of  viewing  the  contents.  She  fought  on  the  consum- 
ing fire  to  have  her  exculpation  heard. 

But  was  she  not  a  shameless  traitor  ?  She  had  caught 
him  by  his  love  of  his  country  and  hope  to  serve  it.  She 
had  wound  into  his  heart  to  bleed  him  of  all  he  knew  and 
sell  the  secrets  for  money.  A  wonderful  sort  of  eloquence 
lay  there,  on  those  coals,  no  doubt.  He  felt  a  slight  move- 
ment of  curiosity  to  glance  at  two  or  three  random  sentences  : 
very  slight.  And  why  read  them  now  ?  They  were  value- 
less to  him,  mere  outcries.  He  judged  her  by  the  brute 
facts.  She  and  her  slowly-consuming  letter  were  of  a  com- 
mon blackness.  Moreover,  to  read  them  when  he  was 
plighted  to  another  woman  would  be  senseless.  In  the  dis- 
covery of  her  baseness,  she  had  made  a  poor  figure.  Doubt- 
less during  the  afternoon  she  had  trimmed  her  intuitive 
Belial  art  of  making  "  the  worse  appear  the  better  cause  : " 
queer  to  peruse,  and  instructive  in  an  unprofitable  depart- 
ment of  knowledge  —  the  tricks  of  the  sex. 

He  said  to  himself,  with  little  intuition  of  the  popular  / 
taste  :    She  would  n't  be  a  bad  heroine  of  Romance  !     He  I 
said  it  derisively  of  the  Romantic.     But  the  right  worship- 
ful heroine  of  Romance  was  the  front-face  female  picture  he  ■ 
had  won  for  his  walls.     Poor  Diana  was  the  flecked  heroine 
of  Reality :  not  always  the  same  ;  not   impeccable  ;  not  an  ^ 
ignorant-innocent,  nor  a  guileless  :  good  under  good  leading  ; 
devoted  to  the  death  in  a  grave  crisis  ;  often  wrestling  with 
her  terrestrial  nature  nobly ;  and  a  growing  soul ;  but  not 


X 


836  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

one  whose  purity  was  carved  in  marble  for  the  assurance  to 
an  Englishman  that  his  possession  of  the  changeless  thing 
defies  time  and  his  fellows,  is  the  pillar  of  his  home  and 
universally  enviable.  Your  fair  one  of  Komance  cannot 
suffer  a  mishap  without  a  plotting  villain,  perchance  many 
of  them,  to  wreak  the  dread  iniquity  :  she  cannot  move 
without  him  ;  she  is  the  marble  block,  and  if  she  is  to  have 
a  feature,  he  is  the  sculptor ;  she  depends  on  him  for  life, 
and  her  human  history  at  least  is  married  to  him  far  more 
than  to  the  rescuing  lover.  No  wonder,  then,  that  men 
should  find  her  thrice  cherishable  featureless,  or  with  the 
most  moderate  possible  indication  of  a  countenance.  Thou- 
sands of  the  excellent  simple  creatures  do  ;  and  every  reader 
of  her  tale.  On  the  contrary,  the  heroine  of  Reality  is  that 
woman  whom  you  have  met  or  heard  of  once  in  your  course 
of  years,  and  very  probably  despised  for  bearing  in  her  com- 
position the  motive  principle ;  at  best,  you  say,  a  singular 
mixture  of  good  and  bad  ;  anything  but  the  feminine  ideal 
of  man.  Feature  to  some  excess,  you  think,  distinguishes 
her.  Yet  she  furnishes  not  any  of  the  sweet  sensual  excite- 
ment pertaining  to  her  spotless  rival  pursued  by  villainy. 
She  knocks  at  the  doors  of  the  mind,  and  the  mind  must 
open  to  be  interested  in  her.  Mind  and  heart  must  be  wide 
open  to  excuse  her  sheer  descent  from  the  pure  ideal  of 
man. 

Dacier's  wandering  reflections  all  came  back  in  crowds  to 
the  judicial  Bench  of  the  Black  Cap.  He  felt  finely,  apart 
from  the  treason,  that  her  want  of  money  degraded  her : 
him  too,  by  contact.  Money  she  might  have  had  to  any 
extent :  upon  application  for  it,  of  course.  How  was  he  to 
imagine  that  she  wanted  money  !  Smilingly  as  she  welcomed 
him  and  his  friends,  entertaining  them  royally,  he  was 
bound  to  think  she  had  means.  A  decent  propriety  bound 
him  not  to  think  of  the  matter  at  all.  He  naturally  sup- 
posed she  was  capable  of  conducting  her  affairs.  And  — 
money  !  It  soiled  his  memory  :  though  the  hour  at  Rovio 
was  rather  pretty,  and  the  scene  at  Copsley  touching ;  other 
times  also,  short  glimpses  of  the  woman  were  taking.  The 
flood  of  her  treachery  effaced  them.  And  why  reflect? 
Constance  called  to  him  to  look  her  way. 

Diana's   letter  died  hard.     The  corners   were  burnt  to 


HEARTLESSNESS   OF   WOMEN   WITH   BRAINS        337 

black  tissue,  with  an  edge  or  two  of  discoloured  paper.  A 
small  frayed  central  heap  still  resisted,  and  in  kindness  to 
the  necessity  for  privacy,  he  impressed  the  fire-tongs  to 
complete  the  execution.  After  which  he  went  to  his  desk 
and  worked,  under  the  presidency  of  Constance. 


CHAPTER  XXXVI 

IS    CONCLUSIVE    AS    TO    THE    HEARTLESSNESS    OF    WOMEN 
WITH    BRAINS 

Hymeneal  rumours  are  those  which  might  be  backed 
to  run  a  victorious  race  with  the  tale  of  evil  fortune  ;  and 
clearly  for  the  reason  that  man's  livelier  half  is  ever  alert 
to  speed  them.  They  travel  with  an  astonishing  celerity 
over  the  land,  like  flames  of  the  dry  beacon-faggots  of  old 
time  in  announcement  of  the  invader  or  a  conquest,  gather- 
ing as  they  go :  wherein,  to  say  nothing  of  their  vastly 
wider  range,  they  surpass  the  electric  wires.  Man's  nuptial 
half  is  kindlingly  concerned  in  the  launch  of  a  new  couple ; 
it  is  the  business  of  the  fair  sex :  and  man  himself  (very 
strangely,  but  nature  quickens  him  still)  lends  a  not  un- 
favouring  eye  to  the  preparations  of  the  matrimonial  vessel 
for  its  oily  descent  into  the  tides,  where  billows  will  soon 
be  rising,  captain  and  mate  soon  discussing  the  fateful 
question  of  who  is  commander.  We  consent,  it  appears,  to 
hope  again  for  mankind  ;  here  is  another  chance  !  Or  else, 
assuming  the  happiness  of  the  pair,  that  pomp  of  ceremo- 
nial, contrasted  with  the  little  wind-blown  candle  they  carry 
between  them,  catches  at  our  weaker  fibres.  After  so  many 
ships  have  foundered,  some  keel  up,  like  poisoned  fish,  at 
the  first  drink  of  water,  it  is  a  gallant  spectacle,  let  us 
avow  ;  and  either  the  world  perpetuating  it  is  heroical  or 
nature  incorrigible  in  the  species.  Marriages  are  unceasing. 
Friends  do  it,  and  enemies  ;  the  unknown  contractors  of 
this  engagement,  or  armistice,  inspire  an  interest.  It 
certainly  is  both  exciting  and  comforting  to  hear  that  man 
and  woman  are  ready  to  join  in  a  mutual  affirmative,  say 
Yes  together  again.     It  sounds  like  the  end  of  the  war. 

22 


338  DIAXA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

The  proclamation  of  the  proximate  marriage  of  a  young 
Minister  of  State  and  the  greatest  heiress  of  her  day ;  — 
notoriously  "  The  young  Minister  of  State "  of  a  famous 
book  written  by  the  beautiful,  now  writhing,  woman  madly 
enamoured  of  him  —  and  the  heiress  whose  dowry  could 
purchase  a  Duchy ;  this  was  a  note  to  make  the  gossips  of 
England  leap  from  their  beds  at  the  midnight  hour  and 
wag  tongues  in  the  market-place.  It  did  away  with  the 
political  hubbub  over  the  Tonans  article,  and  let  it  noise 
abroad  like  nonsense.  The  Hon.  Percy  Dacier  espouses 
Miss  Asper ;  and  she  rescues  him  from  the  snares  of  a  siren, 
he  her  from  the  toils  of  the  Papists.  She  would  have  gone 
over  to  them,  she  was  going  when,  luckily  for  the  Protest- 
ant Faith,  Percy  Dacier  intervened  with  his  proposal. 
Town  and  country  buzzed  the  news ;  and  while  that  dreary 
League  trumpeted  about  the  business  of  the  nation,  a  people 
suddenly  become  Oriental  chattered  of  nothing  but  the 
blissful  union  to  be  celebrated  in  princely  state,  with  every 
musical  accessory,  short  of  Operatic. 

Lady  Wathin  was  an  active  agent  in  this  excitement. 
The  excellent  woman  enjoyed  marriages  of  High  Life : 
which,  as  there  is  presumably  wealth  to  support  them,  are 
manifestly  under  sanction :  and  a  marriage  that  she  could 
consider  one  of  her  own  contrivance,  had  a  delicate  flavour 
of  a  marriage  in  the  family ;  not  quite  equal  to  the  seeing 
a  dear  daughter  of  her  numerous  progeny  conducted  to 
the  altar,  but  excelling  it  in  the  pomp  that  bids  the  heavens 
open.  She  and  no  other  spread  the  tidings  of  Miss  Asper's 
debating  upon  the  step  to  Eome  at  the  very  instant  of 
Percy  Dacier's  declaration  of  his  love ;  —  and  it  was  a 
beautiful  struggle,  that  of  the  half -dedicated  nun  and  her 
deep-rooted  earthly  passion,  love  prevailing !  ^  She  sent 
word  of  to  Lady  Dunstane :  "  You  know  the  interest  I 
have  always  taken  in  dear  Constance  Asper,"  &c.  ;  inviting 
her  to  come  on  a  visit  a  week  before  the  end  of  the  month, 
that  she  might  join  in  the  ceremony  of  a  wedding  "  likely 
to  be  the  grandest  of  our  time."  Pitiful  though  it  was,  to 
think  of  the  bridal  pair  having  but  eight  or  ten  days  at 
the  outside,  for  a  honeymoon,  the  beauty  of  their  "  mutual 
devotion  to  duty"  was  urged  by  Lady  Wathin  upon  all 
hearers. 


HEARTLESSNESS   OF   WOMEN   WITH   BRAINS        339 

Lady  Dunstane  declined  the  invitation.  She  waited  to 
hear  from  her  friend,  and  the  days  went  by ;  she  could  only 
sorrow  for  her  poor  Tony,  divining  her  state.  However 
little  of  wrong  in  the  circumstances,  they  imposed  a  silence 
on  her  decent  mind,  and  no  conceivable  shape  of  writing 
would  transmit  condolences.  She  waited,  with  a  dull  heart- 
ache :  by  no  means  grieving  at  Dacier's  engagement  to  the 
heiress ;  until  Redworth  animated  her,  as  the  bearer  of 
rather  startling  intelligence,  indirectly  relating  to  the  soul 
she  loved.  An  accident  in  the  street  had  befallen  Mr.  War- 
wick. Redworth  wanted  to  know  whether  Diana  should  be 
told  of  it,  though  he  had  no  particulars  to  give ;  and  some- 
what to  his  disappointment,  Lady  Dunstane  said  she  would 
write.  She  delayed,  thinking  the  accident  might  not  be 
serious ;  and  the  information  of  it  to  Diana  surely  would 
be  so.  Kext  day  at  noon  her  visitor  was  Lady  Wathin, 
evidently  perturbed  and  anxious  to  say  more  than  she 
dared :  but  she  received  no  assistance.  After  beating  the 
air  in  every  direction,  especially  dwelling  on  the  fond 
reciprocal  affection  of  the  two  devoted  lovers,  to  be  united 
within  three  days'  time.  Lady  Wathin  said  at  last :  "  And 
is  it  not  shocking  !  I  talk  of  a  marriage  and  am  appalled  by 
a  death.  That  poor  man  died  last  night  in  the  hospital. 
I  mean  poor  Mr.  Warwick.  He  was  recovering,  getting 
strong  and  well,  and  he  was  knocked  down  at  a  street- 
crossing  and  died  last  night.     It  is  a  warning  to  us  !  " 

"  Mr.  Redworth  happened  to  hear  of  it  at  his  Club,  near 
which  the  accident  occurred,  and  he  called  at  the  hospital. 
Mr.  Warwick  was  then  alive,"  said  Lady  Dunstane ;  add- 
ing: "Well,  if  prevention  is  better  than  cure,  as  we  hear! 
Accidents  are  the  specific  for  averting  the  maladies  of  age, 
which  are  a  certain  crop  !  " 

Lady  Wathin's  eyelids  worked  and  her  lips  shut  fast  at 
the  coldhearted  remark  void  of  meaning. 

She  sighed.     "  So  ends  a  life  of  misery,  my  dear! " 

"  You  are  compassionate." 

"  I  hope  so.  But  .  .  .  Indeed  I  must  speak,  if  you  will 
let  me.     I  think  of  the  living." 

Lady  Dunstane  widened  her  eyes.     "  Of  Mrs.  Warwick  ?  " 

"  She  has  now  the  freedom  she  desired.  I  think  of 
others.     Forgive  me,  but  Constance  Asper  is  to  me  as  a 


340  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

daughter.  I  have  perhaps  no  grounds  for  any  apprehen- 
sion. Love  so  ardent,  so  sincere,  was  never  shown  by 
bridegroom  elect :  and  it  is  not  extraordinary  to  those 
acquainted  with  dear  Constance.  But  one  may  be  a  wor- 
shipped saint  and  experience  defection.  The  terrible  sto- 
ries one  hears  of  a  power  of  fascination  almost  .  .  . ! "  Lady 
Wathin  hung  for  the  word. 

"  Infernal,"  said  Lady  Dunstane,  whose  brows  had  been 
bent  inquiringly.  "  Have  no  fear.  The  freedom  you  allude 
to  will  not  be  used  to  interfere  with  any  entertainment  in 
prospect.  It  was  freedom  my  friend  desired.  Now  that 
her  jewel  is  restored  to  her,  she  is  not  the  person  to  throw 
it  away,  be  sure.     And  pray,  drop  the  subject." 

"  One  may  rely  .  .  .  you  think  ?  " 

"Oh!  Oh!''  ^       ^ 

"  This  release  coming  just  before  the  wedding !  .  .  ." 

"  I  should  hardly  suppose  the  man  to  be  the  puppet  you 
depict,  or  indicate." 

"  It  is  because  men  —  so  many  —  are  not  puppets  that 
one  is  conscious  of  alarm." 

"  Your  previous  remark,"  said  Lady  Dunstane,  "  sounded 
superstitious.  Your  present  one  has  an  antipodal  basis. 
But,  as  for  your  alarm,  check  it :  and  spare  me  further. 
My  friend  has  acknowledged  powers.  Considering  that 
she  does  not  use  them,  you  should  learn  to  respect  her." 

Lady  Wathin  bowed  stiffly.  She  refused  to  partake  of 
lunch,  having,  she  said,  satisfied  her  conscience  by  the  per- 
formance of  a  duty  and  arranged  with  her  flyman  to  catch 
a  train.  Her  cousin  Lady  Dunstane  smiled  loftily  at  every- 
thing she  uttered,  and  she  felt  that  if  a  woman  like  this 
Mrs.  Warwick  could  put  division  between  blood-relatives, 
she  could  do  worse,  and  was  to  be  dreaded  up  to  the  hour 
of  the  nuptials. 

"  I  meant  no  harm  in  coming,"  she  said,  at  the  shaking 
of  hands. 

"  No,  no ;  I  understand,"  said  her  hostess  :  "  you  are  hen- 
hearted  over  your  adopted  brood.  The  situation  is  percep- 
tible and  your  intention  creditable." 

As  one  of  the  good  women  of  the  world.  Lady  Wathin  in 
departing  was  indignant  at  the  tone  and  dialect  of  a  younger 
woman  not  modestly  concealing  her  possession  of  the  larger 


HEAETLESSNESS   OF    WOMEN   WITH  BRAINS        341 

brain.     Brains  in  women  she  both  dreaded  and  detested; 
she  believed  them  to  be  devilish.     Here  were  instances  :  — 
they  had  driven  poor  Sir  Lukin  to  evil  courses,  and  that 
poor  Mr.  Warwick  straight  under  the  wheels  of  a  cab.     Sir 
Lukin's  name  was  trotting  in  public  with  a  naughty  Mrs. 
Fryar-Gunnett's  :  Mrs.  Warwick  might  still  trim  her  arts 
to  baffle  the  marriage.     Women  with  brains,  moreover,  are 
all  heartless :  they  have  no  pity  for  distress,  no  horror  of 
catastrophes,  no   joy  in   the   happiness  of  the  deserving. 
Brains  in  men  advance  a  household  to  station ;  but  brains 
in  women  divide  it  and  are  the  wrecking  of  society.     For- 
tunately  Lady  Wathin   knew  she  could  rally  a  powerful 
moral  contingent,  the  aptitude  of  which  for  a  one-minded 
cohesion  enabled  it  to  crush  those  fractional  daughters  of 
mischief.     She  was  a  really  good  woman  of  the  world,  head- 
ing a  multitude;  the  same  whom  you  are  accustomed  to 
hear   exalted;  lucky  in   having  had   a   guided  girlhood,  a 
thick-curtained  prudence  ;  and  in  having  stock  in  the  moral 
funds,  shares  in  the  sentimental  tramways.     Wherever  the 
world  laid  its  hoards  or  ran  its  lines,  she  was  found,  and 
forcible  enough   to  be  eminent;  though  at  fixed  hours  of 
the  day,  even  as  she  washed  her  hands,  she  abjured  world- 
liness:  a  performance  that  cleansed  her.     If  she  did  not 
niake  morality  appear  loveable  to  the  objects  of  her  dislike, 
it  was  owing  to  her  want  of  brains  to  see  the  origin,  nature 
and  right  ends  of  morality.     But  a  world  yet  more  deficient 
than  she,  esteemed  her  cordially  for  being  a  bulwark  of  the 
present   edifice;  which   looks   a   solid  structure  when  the 
microscope  is  not  applied  to  its  components. 

Supposing  Percy  Dacier  a  dishonourable  tattler  as  well 
as  an  icy  lover,  and  that  Lady  Wathin,  through  his  bride, 
had  become  privy  to  the  secret  between  him  and  Diana  ? 
There  is  reason  to  think  that  she  would  have  held  it  in 
terror  over  the  baneful  woman,  but  not  have  persecuted 
lier :  for  she  was  by  no  means  the  active  malignant  of  theat- 
rical plots.  No,  she  would  have  charged  it  upon  the  posses- 
sion of  brains  by  women,  and  have  had  a  further  motive 
for  inciting  the  potent  dignitary  her  husband  to  employ  his 
authority  to  repress  the  sex's  exercise  of  those  fell  weapons, 
hurtful  alike  to  them  and  all  coming  near  them. 

So  extreme  was  her  dread  of  Mrs.  Warwick,  that  she 


342  DIANA  OP  THE   CROSSWAYS 

drove  from  the  London  railway  station  to  see  Constance 
and  be  reassured  by  her  tranquil  aspect. 

Sweet  Constance  and  her  betrothed  Percy  were  together, 
examining  a  missal. 

Lady  Dunstane  despatched  a  few  words  of  the  facts  to 
Diana.  She  hoped  to  hear  from  her;  rather  hoped,  for  the 
moment,  not  to  see  her.  No  answer  came.  The  great  day 
of  the  nuptials  came  and  passed.  She  counted  on  her  hus- 
band's appearance  the  next  morning,  as  the  good  gentle- 
man made  a  point  of  visiting  her,  to  entertain  the  wife 
he  adored,  whenever  he  had  a  wallet  of  gossip  that  would 
overlay  the  blank  of  his  absence.  He  had  been  to  the 
church  of  the  wedding  —  he  did  not  say  with  whom :  —  all 
the  world  was  there;  and  he  rapturously  described  the 
ceremony,  stating  that  it  set  women  weeping  and  caused 
him  to  behave  like  a  fool. 

"You  are  impressionable,"  said  his  wife. 

He  murmured  something  in  praise  of  the  institution  of 
marriage  '■ —  when  celebrated  impressively,  it  seemed. 

"  Tony  calls  the  social  world  '  the  theatre  of  appetites, ' 
as  we  have  it  at  present,"  she  said;  "and  the  world  at  a 
wedding  is,  one  may  reckon,  in  the  second  act  of  the  hun- 
gry tragi-comedy." 

"Yes,  there  's  the  breakfast,"  Sir  Lukin  assented.  Mrs. 
Fryar-Gunnett  was  much  more  intelligible  to  him :  in  fact, 
quite  so,  as  to  her  speech. 

Emma's  heart  now  yearned  to  her  Tony.  Consulting 
her  strength,  she  thought  she  might  journey  to  London, 
and  on  the  third  morning  after  the  Dacier-Asper  marriage, 
she  started. 

Diana's  door  was  open  to  Arthur  Khodes  when  Emma 
reached  it. 

"  Have  you  seen  her?  "  she  asked  him. 

His  head  shook  dolefully.  "Mrs.  Warwick  is  unwell; 
she  has  been  working  too  hard." 

"You  also,  I  'm  afraid." 

"No."     He  could  deny  that,  whatever  the  look  of  him. 

"Come  to  me  at  Copsley  soon,"  said  she,  entering  to 
Danvers  in  the  passage. 

"  My  mistress  is  upstairs,  my  lady,"  said  Danvers.  "  She 
is  lying  on  her  bed." 


HEAETLESSNESS   OF   WOMEN  WITH  BRAINS        343 

"She  is  ill?" 

"  She  has  been  lying  on  her  bed  ever  since. 

"  Since  what  ?  "  Lady  Dunstane  spoke  sharply. 

Danvers  retrieved  her  indiscretion.    "  Since  she  heard  of 

the  accident,  my  lady."  ^^ 

"  Take  my  name  to  her.     Or  no :  I  can  venture. 

"  I  am  not  allowed  to  go  in  and  speak  to  her.  You  will 
find  the  room  quite  dark,  my  lady,  and  very  cold.  It  is 
her  command.  My  mistress  will  not  let  me  light  the  lire; 
and  she  has  not  eaten  or  drunk  of  anything  since.  ... 
She  will  die,  if  you  do  not  persuade  her  to  take  nourish- 
ment: a  little,  for  a  beginning.     It  wants  the  beginning. 

Emma  went  upstairs,  thinking  of  the  enigmatical  maid, 
that  she  must  be  a  good  soul  after  all.  Diana's  bedroom 
door  was  opened  slowly.  ,    -,     „  -r^ 

"You  will  not  be  able  to  see  at  first,  my  lady,"  Danvers 
whispered.  "  The  bed  is  to  the  left,  and  a  chair.  I  would 
bring  in  a  candle,  but  it  hurts  her  eyes.     She  forbids  it. 

Emma  stepped  in.  The  chill  thick  air  of  the  unlighted 
London  room  was  cavernous.  She  almost  forgot  the  beloved 
of  her  heart  in  the  thought  that  a  living  woman  had  been 
lying  here  more  than  two  days  and  nights,  fasting.  The 
proof  of  an  uttermost  misery  revived  the  circumstances 
within  her  to  render  her  friend's  presence  in  this  desert  of 
darkness  credible.  She  found  the  bed  by  touch,  silently, 
and  distinguished  a  dark  heap  on  the  bed;  she  lieard  no 
breathing.  She  sat  and  listened;  then  she  stretched  her 
hand  and  met  her  Tony's.  It  lay  open.  It  was  the  hand 
of  a  drowned  woman. 

Shutters  and  curtains  and  the  fireless  grate  gave  the 
room  an  appalling  likeness  to  the  vaults. 

So  like  to  the  home  of  death  it  seemed,  that  m  a  tew 
minutes  the  watcher  had  lost  count  of  time  and  kept  but 
a  wormy  memory  of  the  daylight.  She  dared  not  speak, 
for  some  fear  of  startling;  for  the  worse  fear  of  never 
getting  answer.  Tony's  hand  was  lifeless.  Her  clasp  ot 
it  struck  no  warmth.  ^      ,      •       i  4. 

She  stung  herself  with  bitter  reproaches  for  having  let 
common  mundane  sentiments,  worthy  of  a  Lady  Wathm, 
bar  her  instant  offer  of  her  bosom  to  the  beloved  who 
suffered  in  this  depth  of  mortal  agony.     Tony's  love  of 


344  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

a  man,  as  she  should  have  known,  would  be  wrought  of 
the  elements  of  our  being:  when  other  women  named  Hap- 
piness, she  said  Life;  in  division.  Death.  Her  body  lying 
still  upon  the  bed  here  was  a  soul  borne  onward  by  the 
river  of  Death. 

The  darkness  gave  sight  after  a  while,  like  a  curtain 
lifting  on  a  veil:  the  dead  light  of  the  underworld.  Tony 
lay  with  her  face  up,  her  underlip  dropped;  straight  from 
head  to  feet.  The  outline  of  her  face,  without  hue  of  it, 
could  be  seen:  sign  of  the  hapless  women  that  have  souls 
in  love.  Hateful  love  of  men!  Emma  thought,  and  was 
moved  to  feel  at  the  wrist  for  her  darling's  pulse.  He  has 
killed  her!  the  thought  flashed,  as,  with  pangs  chilling 
her  frame,  the  pressure  at  the  wrist  continued  insensible 
of  the  faintest  beat.  She  clasped  it,  trembling,  in  pain  to 
stop  an  outcry. 

"It  is  Emmy,"  said  the  voice. 

Emma's  heart  sprang  to  heaven  on  a  rush  of  thanks. 

"My  Tony,"  she  breathed  softly. 

She  hung  for  a  further  proof  of  life  in  the  motionless 
body.     "  Tony  !  "  she  said. 

The  answer  was  at  her  hand,  a  thread-like  return  of  her 
clasp. 

"It  is  Emmy  come  to  stay  with  you,  never  to  leave 
you." 

The  thin  still  answer  was  at  her  hand  a  moment;  the 
fingers  fell  away.  A  deep  breath  was  taken  twice  to  say : 
"Don't  talk  to  me." 

Emma  retained  the  hand.  She  was  warned  not  to  press 
it  by  the  deadness  following  its  effort  to  reply. 

But  Tony  lived;  she  had  given  proof  of  life.  Over  this 
little  wavering  taper  in  the  vaults  Emma  cowered,  cherish- 
ing the  hand,  silently  hoping  for  the  voice. 

It  came :  "  Winter." 

"It  is  a  cold  winter,  Tony." 

"My  dear  will  be  cold." 

"I  will  light  the  fire." 

Emma  lost  no  time  in  deciding  to  seek  the  match-box. 
The  fire  was  lit  and  it  flamed;  it  seemed  a  revival  in  the 
room.  Coming  back  to  the  bedside,  she  discerned  her 
Tony's  lack-lustre  large  dark  eyes  and  her  hollow  cheeks; 


HEARTLESSNESS    OF    WOMEN   WITH   BRAINS        845 

her  mouth  open  to  air  as  to  the  drawing-in  of  a  sword; 
rather  as  to  the  releaser  than  the  sustainer.  Her  feet  were 
on  the  rug  her  maid  had  placed  to  cover  them.  Emma 
leaned  across  the  bed  to  put  them  to  her  breast,  beneath 
her  fur  mantle,  and  held  them  there  despite  the  half- 
animate  tug  of  the  limbs  and  the  shaft  of  iciness  they  sent 
to  her  very  heart.  When  she  had  restored  them  to  some 
warmth,  she  threw  aside  her  bonnet  and  lying  beside  Tony, 
took  her  in  her  arms,  heaving  now  and  then  a  deep  sigh. 

She  kissed  her  cheek. 

"It  is  Emmy." 

"Kiss  her." 

"I  have  no  strength." 

Emma  laid  her  face  on  the  lips.  They  were  cold ;  even 
the  breath  between  them  cold. 

"  Has  Emmy  been  long  .   .  .   ?  " 

"Here,  dear?     I  think  so.     I  am  with  my  darling." 

Tony  moaned.  The  warmth  and  the  love  were  bringing 
back  her  anguish. 

She  said:  "I  have  been  happy.     It  is  not  hard  to  go." 

Emma  strained  to  her.  "  Tony  will  wait  for  her  soul's 
own  soul  to  go,  the  two  together." 

There  was  a  faint  convulsion  in  the  body.  "  If  I  cry,  I 
shall  go  in  pain." 

"You  are  in  Emmy's  arms,  my  beloved." 

Tony's  eyes  closed  for  forgetfulness  under  that  sensa- 
tion. A  tear  ran  down  from  her,  but  the  pain  was  lax  and 
neighboured  sleep,  like  the  pleasure. 

So  passed  the  short  winter  day,  little  spoken. 

Then  Emma  bethought  her  of  a  way  of  leading  Tony  to 
take  food,  and  she  said:  "I  shall  stay  with  you;  I  shall 
send  for  clothes;  I  am  rather  hungry.  Don't  stir,  dear. 
I  will  be  mistress  of  the  house." 

She  went  below  to  the  kitchen,  where  a  few  words  in 
the  ear  of  a  Frenchwoman  were  sufficient  to  waken  imme- 
diate comprehension  of  what  was  wanted,  and  smart  ser- 
vice: within  ten  minutes  an  appetizing  bouillon  sent  its 
odour  over  the  bedroom.  Tony,  days  back,  had  said  her 
last  to  the  act  of  eating;  but  Emma  sipping  at  the  spoon 
and  expressing  satisfaction,  was  a  pleasant  picture.  The 
bouillon  smelt  pleasantly. 


346  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

"  Your  servants  love  you, "  Emma  said. 

"Ah,  poor  good  souls." 

"  They  crowded  up  to  me  to  hear  of  you.  Madame  of 
course  at  the  first  word  was  oft'  to  her  pots.  And  we 
English  have  the  habit  of  calling  ourselves  the  practical 
people !  —  This  bouillon  is  consummate.  —  However,  we 
have  the  virtues  of  barbarians ;  we  can  love  and  serve  for 
love.  I  never  tasted  anything  so  good.  I  could  become 
a  glutton." 

"Do,"  said  Tony. 

"I  should  be  ashamed  to  *  drain  the  bowl '  all  to  myself: 
a  solitary  toper  is  a  horrid  creature,  unless  he  makes  a 
song  of  it." 

"Emmy  makes  a  song  of  it  to  me." 

"  But  ^  pledge  me  '  is  a  noble  saying,  when  you  think  of 
humanity's  original  hunger  for  the  whole.  It  is  there  that 
our  civilizing  commenced,  and  I  am  particularly  fond  of 
hearing  the  call.  It  is  grandly  historic.  So  pledge  me, 
Tony.  We  two  can  feed  from  one  spoon;  it  is  a  closer 
bond  than  the  loving  cup.  I  want  you  just  to  taste  it  and 
excuse  my  gluttony." 

Tony  murmured,  "No."  The  spoon  was  put  to  her 
mouth.  She  sighed  to  resist.  The  stronger  will  com- 
pelled her  to  move  her  lips.  Emma  fed  her  as  a  child, 
and  nature  sucked  for  life. 

The  first  effect  was  a  gush  of  tears. 

Emma  lay  with  her  that  night,  when  the  patient  was 
the  better  sleeper.  But  during  the  night  at  intervals  she 
had  the  happiness  of  feeling  Tony's  hand  travelling  to 
make  sure  of  her. 


CHAIVIPIONS   OF  THE  STKICKEN   LADY  847 


CHAPTER  XXXVII 

AN   EXHIBITION    OF    SOME   CHAMPIONS    OF    THE   STRICKEN 

LADY 

Close  upon  the  hour  of  ten  every  morning  the  fortuitous 
meeting  of  two  gentlemen  at  Mrs.  Warwick's  housedoor 
was  a  signal  for  punctiliously  stately  greetings,  the  salu- 
tation of  the  raised  hat  and  a  bow  of  the  head  from  a  posi- 
tion of  military  erectness,  followed  by  the  remark :  "  T 
trust  you  are  well,  sir :  "  to  which  the  reply :  "  I  am  very 
well,  sir,  and  trust  you  are  the  same,"  was  deemed  a  com- 
plimentary fulfilment  of  their  mutual  obligation  in  pres- 
ence. Mr.  Sullivan  Smith's  initiative  imparted  this 
exercise  of  formal  manners  to  Mr.  Arthur  lihodes,  whose 
renewed  appearance,  at  the  minute  of  his  own  arrival,  he 
viewed,  as  he  did  not  conceal,  with  a  disappointed  and  a 
reproving  eye.  The  inquiry  after  the  state  of  Mrs.  War- 
wick's health  having  received  its  tolerably  comforting 
answer  from  the  footman,  they  left  their  cards  in  turn, 
then  descended  the  doorsteps,  faced  for  the  performance 
of  the  salute,  and  departed  their  contrary  ways. 

The  pleasing  intelligence  refreshed  them  one  morning, 
that  they  would  be  welcomed  by  Lady  Dunstane.  There- 
upon Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  wheeled  about  to  Mr.  Arthur 
Rhodes  and  observed  to  him:  *'Sir,  I  might  claim,  by 
right  of  seniority,  to  be  the  foremost  of  us  two  in  offering 
my  respects  to  the  lady,  but  the  way  is  open  to  you." 

"Sir,"  said  Mr.  Arthur  Rhodes,  "permit  me  to  defer  to 
your  many  superior  titles  to  that  distinction." 

"The  honour,  sir,  lies  rather  in  the  bestowing  than  in 
the  taking." 

"  1  venture  to  think,  sir,  that  though  I  cannot  speak  pure 
Castilian,  I  require  no  lesson  from  a  Grandee  of  Spain  in 
acknowledging  the  dues  of  my  betters." 

"I  will  avow  myself  conquered,  sir,  by  your  overpower- 
ing condescension,"  said  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith;  "and  I 
entreat  you  to  ascribe  my  acceptance  of  your  brief  retire- 
ment to  the  urgent  chai'acter  of  the  business  I  have  at 
heart." 


348  DIANA  OF  THE  CEOSSWAYS 

He  laid  his  fingers  on  the  panting  spot,  and  bowed. 

Mr.  Arthur  Ehodes,  likewise  bowing,  deferentially  fell 
to  rearward. 

"If  I  mistake  not,"  said  the  Irish  gentleman,  "I  am 
indebted  to  Mr.  Ehodes;  and  we  have  been  joint  partici- 
pators in  the  hospitality  of  Mrs.  Warwick's  table." 

The  English  gentleman  replied:  "It  was  there  that  I 
first  had  the  pleasure  of  an  acquaintance  which  is  graven 
on  my  memory,  as  the  words  of  the  wise  king  on  tablets  of 
gold  and  silver." 

Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  gravely  smiled  at  the  unwonted 
match  he  had  found  in  ceremonious  humour,  in  Saxonland, 
and  saying:  "I  shall  not  long  detain  you,  Mr.  Rhodes." 
he  passed  through  the  doorway. 

Arthur  waited  for  him,  pacing  up  and  down,  for  a  quar- 
ter of  an  hour,  when  a  totally  different  man  reappeared  in 
the  same  person,  and  was  the  Sullivan  Smith  of  the  rosy 
beaming  features  and  princely  heartiness.  He  was  ac- 
costed: "Now,  my  dear  boy,  it  's  your  turn  to  try  if  you 
have  a  chance,  and  good  luck  go  with  ye.  I  've  said  what 
I  could  on  your  behalf,  for  you  're  one  of  ten  thousand  in 
this  country,  you  are." 

Mr.  Sullivan  Smith  had  solemnified  himself  to  proffer 
a  sober  petition  within  the  walls  of  the  newly  widowed 
lady's  house;  namely,  for  nothing  less  than  that  sweet 
lady's  now  unfettered  hand:  and  it  had  therefore  been  per- 
fectly natural  to  him,  until  his  performance  ended  with 
the  destruction  of  his  hopes,  to  deliver  himself  in  the  high 
Castilian  manner.  Quite  unexpected,  however,  was  the 
reciprocal  loftiness  of  tone  spontaneously  adopted  by  the 
young  English  squire,  for  whom,  in  consequence,  he  con- 
ceived a  cordial  relish;  and  as  he  paced  in  the  footsteps 
of  Arthur,  anxious  to  quiet  his  curiosity  by  hearing  how  it 
had  fared  with  one  whom  he  had  to  suppose  the  second 
applicant,  he  kept  ejaculating :  "  Not  a  bit !  The  fellow 
can't  be  Saxon  !  And  she  had  a  liking  for  him.  She  's 
nigh  coming  of  the  age  when  a  woman  takes  to  the  chicks. 
Better  he  than  another,  if  it 's  to  be  any  one.  For  he  's 
got  fun  in  him ;  he  carries  his  own  condiments,  instead  of 
borrowing  from  the  popular  castors,  as  is  their  way  over 
here.     But  I  might  have  known  there 's  always  sure  to 


CHAMPIONS   OF   THE   STRICKEN  LADY  349 

be  salt  and  savour  in  the  man  she  covers  with  her  wing. 
Excepting,  if  you  please,  my  dear  lady,  a  bad  shot  you 
made  at  a  rascal  cur,  no  more  worthy  of  you  than  Beelze- 
bub of  Paradise.  No  matter!  The  daughters  of  Erin 
must  share  the  fate  of  their  mother  Isle,  that  their  tears 
may  shine  in  the  burst  of  sun  to  follow.  For  personal  and 
patriotic  motives,  I  would  have  cheered  her  and  been  like 
a  wild  ass  combed  and  groomed  and  tamed  by  the  adorable 
creature,  But  her  friend  says  there  's  not  a  whisk  of  a 
chance  for  me,  and  I  must  roam  the  desert,  kicking  up, 
and  worshipping  the  star  I  hail  brightest.  They  know  me 
not,  who  think  I  can't  worship.  Why,  what  were  I  with- 
out my  star?     At  best  a  pickled  porker." 

Sullivan  Smith  became  aware  of  a  ravishing  melodious- 
ness in  the  soliloquy,  as  well  as  a  clean  resemblance  in  the 
simile.  He  would  certainly  have  proceeded  to  improvize 
impassioned  verse,  if  he  had  not  seen  Arthur  Rhodes  on 
the  pavement.  "  So,  here  's  the  boy.  Query,  the  face  he 
wears." 

"How  kind  of  you  to  wait,"  said  Arthur. 

"We'll  call  it  sympathy,  for  convenience,"  rejoined 
Sullivan  Smith.     "Well,  and  what  next?" 

"You  know  as  much  as  I  do.  Thank  heaven,  she  is 
recovering." 

"Is  that  all?" 

"Why,  what  more?" 

Arthur  was  jealously  inspected. 

"  You  look  open-hearted,  my  dear  boy."  Sullivan  Smith 
blew  the  sound  of  a  reflective  ahem.  "Excuse  me  for 
cornemusing  in  your  company,"  he  said.  "But  seriously, 
there  was  only  one  thing  to  pardon  your  hurrying  to  the 
lady's  door  at  such  a  season,  when  the  wind  tells  tales  to 
the  world.     She  's  down  with  a  cold,  you  know." 

"An  influenza,"  said  Arthur. 

The  simplicity  of  the  acquiescence  was  vexatious  to  a 
champion  desirous  of  hostilities,  to  vindicate  the  lady,  in 
addition  to  his  anxiety  to  cloak  her  sad  plight. 

"She  caught  it  from  contact  with  one  of  the  inhabitants 
of  this  country.  'T  is  the  fate  of  us  Irish,  and  we're  con- 
demned to  it  for  the  sin  of  getting  tired  of  our  own.  I 
begin  to  sneeze  when  I  land  at  Holyhead.     Unbutton  a 


350  DIANA  OF  TWB  CROSSWAYS 

waistcoat  here,  in  the  hope  of  meeting  a  heart,  and  you  're 
lucky  in  escaping  a  pulmonary  attack  of  no  common 
severity,  while  the  dog  that  infected  you  scampers  off,  to 
celebrate  his  honeymoon  mayhap.  Ah,  but  call  at  her 
house  in  shoals,  the  world  '11  soon  be  saying  it 's  worse 
than  a  coughing  cold.  If  you  came  to  lead  her  out  of  it 
in  triumph,  the  laugh  'd  be  with  you,  and  the  lady  well 
covered.     W  ye  understand?  " 

The  allusion  to  the  dog's  honeymoon  had  put  Arthur 
Ehodes  on  the  track  of  the  darting  cracker-metaphor. 

"I  think  I  do,"  he  said.  "She  will  soon  be  at  Copsley 
—  Lady  Dunstane's  house,  on  the  hills  —  and  there  we  can 
see  her." 

"  And  that 's  next  to  the  happiness  of  consoling  —  if  only 
it  had  been  granted  !  She  's  not  an  ordinary  widow,  to  be 
caught  when  the  tear  of  lamentation  has  opened  a  prac- 
ticable path  or  water-way  to  the  poor  nightcapped  jewel 
within.  So,  and  you're  a  candid  admirer,  Mr.  Rhodes! 
Well,  and  I  '11  be  one  with  you;  for  there  's  not  a  star  in 
the  firmament  more  deserving  of  homage  than  that  lady." 

"Let 's  walk  in  the  park  and  talk  of  her,"  said  Arthur. 
"There  's  no  sweeter  subject  to  me." 

His  boyish  frankness  rejoiced  Sullivan  Smith. 

"As  long  as  you  like! — nor  to  me!"  he  exclaimed. 
"And  that  ever  since  I  first  beheld  her  on  the  night  of  a 
Ball  in  Dublin:  before  I  had  listened  to  a  word  of  her 
speaking:  and  she  bore  her  father's  Irish  name:  —  none  of 
your  Warwicks  and  your  .  .  .  But  let  the  cur  go  bark- 
ing. He  can't  tell  what  he's  lost;  perhaps  he  doesn't 
care.  And  after  inflicting  his  hydrophobia  on  her  tender 
fame  !  Pooh,  sir ;  you  call  it  a  civilized  country,  where 
you  and  I  and  dozens  of  others  are  ready  to  start  up  as 
brothers  of  the  lady,  to  defend  her,  and  are  paralyzed  by 
the  Law.  'T  is  a  law  they  've  instituted  for  the  protection 
of  dirty  dogs  —  their  majority  !  " 

"I  owe  more  to  Mrs.  Warwick  than  to  any  soul  I 
know,"  said  Arthur. 

"  Let 's  hear,"  quoth  Sullivan  Smith;  proceeding:  "  She  's 
the  Arabian  Nights  in  person,  that's  sure;  and  Shake- 
speare's Plays,  tragic  and  comuc;  and  the  Book  of  Celtic 
History;  and  Erin  incarnate  —  down  with  a  cold,  no  matter 


CHAMPIONS   OP  THE  STRICKEN  LADY  351 

where;  but  we  know  where  it  was  caught.  So  there ^s  a 
pretty  library  for  who  's  to  own  her  now  she  's  enfranchized 
by  circumstances;  —  and  a  poetical  figure  too  !  " 

He  subsided  for  his  companion  to  rhapsodize. 

Arthur  was  overcharged  with  feeling,  and  could  say 
only:  "It  would  be  another  world  to  me  if  I  lost  her." 

"  True;  but  what  of  the  lady  ?  " 

"No  praise  of  mine  could  do  her  justice." 

"That  may  be,  but  it 's  negative  of  yourself,  and  not  a 
portrait  of  the  object.  Has  n't  she  the  brain  of  Socrates 
—  or  better,  say  Minerva,  on  the  bust  of  Venus,  and  the 
remainder  of  her  finished  off  to  an  exact  resemblance  of 
her  patronymic  Goddess  of  the  bow  and  quiver?" 

"She  has  a  wise  head  and  is  beautiful." 

"And  chaste." 

Arthur  reddened :  he  was  prepared  to  maintain  it,  could 
not  speak  it. 

"  She  is  to  us  in  this  London,  what  the  run  of  water  was 
to  Theocritus  in  Sicily:  the  nearest  to  the  visibly  divine," 
he  said,  and  was  applauded. 

"  Good,  and  on  you  go.  Top  me  a  few  superlatives  on 
that,  and  I  'm  your  echo,  my  friend.  Is  n't  the  seeing  and 
listening  to  her  like  sitting  under  the  silvery  canopy  of  a 
fountain  in  high  Summer  ?  " 

"  All  the  comparisons  are  yours,"  Arthur  said  enviously. 

"Mr.  Rhodes,  you  are  a  poet,  I  believe,  and  all  you 
require  to  loosen  your  tongue  is  a  drop  of  Bacchus,  so  if 
you  will  do  me  the  extreme  honour  to  dine  with  me  at  my 
Club  this  evening,  we  '11  resume  the  toast  that  should  never 
be  uttered  dry.     You  reprove  me  justly,  my  friend." 

Arthur  laughed  and  accepted.  The  Club  was  named, 
and  the  hour,  and  some  items  of  the  little  dinner:  the 
birds  and  the  year  of  the  wines. 

It  surprised  him  to  meet  Mr.  Redworth  at  the  table  of 
his  host.  A  greater  surprise  was  the  partial  thaw  in 
Redworth's  bearing  toward  him.  But,  as  it  was  partial, 
and  he  a  youth  and  poor,  not  even  the  genial  influences  of 
Bacchus  could  lift  him  to  loosen  his  tongue  under  the 
repressing  presence  of  the  man  he  knew  to  be  his  censor, 
though  Sullivan  Smith  encouraged  him  with  praises  and 
opportunities.     He  thought  of  the  many  occasions  when 


352  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Mrs.  Warwick's  art  of  management  had  produced  a  tacit 
harmony  between  them.  She  had  no  peer.  The  dinner 
failed  of  the  pleasure  he  had  expected  from  it.  Eedworth's 
bluntness  killed  the  flying  metaphors,  and  at  the  end  of 
the  entertainment  he  and  Sullivan  Smith  were  drumming 
upon  politics. 

"Fancies  he  has  the  key  of  the  Irish  diflBculty!"  said 
the  latter,  clapping  hand  on  his  shoulder,  by  way  of  bless- 
ing, as  they  parted  at  the  Club-steps. 

Redworth  asked  Arthur  Rhodes  the  way  he  was  going, 
and  walked  beside  him. 

"I  suppose  you  take  exercise;  don't  get  colds  and  that 
kind  of  thing,"  he  remarked  in  the  old  bullying  fashion; 
and  changed  it  abruptly.  "I  am  glad  to  have  met  you 
this  evening.  I  hope  you  '11  dine  with  me  one  day  next 
week.     Have  you  seen  Mrs.  Warwick  lately?  " 

"She  is  unwell;  she  has  been  working  too  hard,"  said 
Arthur. 

"Seriously  unwell,  do  you  mean?" 

"Lady  Dunstane  is  at  her  house,  and  speaks  of  her 
recovering." 

"  Ah.     You  've  not  seen  her?  " 

"Not  yet." 

"Well,  good-night." 

Redworth  left  him,  and  only  when  moved  by  gratitude 
to  the  lad  for  his  mention  of  Mrs.  Warwick's  "working 
too  hard,"  as  the  cause  of  her  illness,  recollected  the 
promised  dinner  and  the  need  for  having  his  address. 

He  had  met  Sullivan  Smith  accidentally  in  the  morning 
and  accepted  the  invitation  to  meet  young  Rhodes,  because 
these  two,  of  all  men  living,  were  for  the  moment  dearest 
to  him,  as  Diana  Warwick's  true  and  simple  champions; 
and  he  had  intended  a  perfect  cordiality  toward  them  both; 
the  end  being  a  semi-wrangle  with  the  patriot,  and  a 
patronizing  bluntness  with  the  boy;  who,  by  the  way, 
would  hardly  think  him  sincere  in  the  offer  of  a  seat  at 
his  table.  He  owned  himself  incomplete.  He  never  could 
do  the  thing  he  meant,  in  the  small  matters  not  leading  to 
fortune.  But  they  led  to  happiness  !  Redworth  was  guilty 
of  a  sigh:  for  now  Diana  Warwick  stood  free;  doubly  free, 
he  was  reduced  to  reflect  in  a  wavering  dubiousness.     Her 


CHAMPIONS   OF   THE   STKICKEN   LADY  353 

more  than  inclination  for  Dacier,  witnessed  by  him,  and 
the  shot  of  the  world,  flying  randomly  on  the  subject,  had 
struck  this  cuirassier,  making  light  of  his  armour,  without 
causing  any  change  of  his  habitual  fresh  countenance.  As 
for  the  scandal,  it  had  never  shaken  his  faith  in  her  nature. 
He  thought  of  the  passion.  His  heart  struck  at  Diana's, 
and  whatever  might  by  chance  be  true  in  the  scandal 
affected  him  little,  if  but  her  heart  were  at  liberty.  That 
was  the  prize  he  coveted,  having  long  read  the  nature  of 
the  woman  and  wedded  his  spirit  to  it.  She  would  com- 
plete him. 

Of  course,  infatuated  men  argue  likewise,  and  scandal 
does  not  move  them.  At  a  glance,  the  lower  instincts  and 
the  higher  spirit  appear  equally  to  have  the  philosophy  of 
overlooking  blemishes.  The  difference  between  appetite 
and  love  is  shown  when  a  man,  after  years  of  service,  can 
hear  and  see,  and  admit  the  possible,  and  still  desire  in 
worship;  knowing  that  we  of  earth  are  begrimed  and  must 
be  cleansed  for  presentation  daily  on  our  passage  through 
the  miry  ways,  but  that  our  souls,  if  flame  of  a  soul  shall 
have  come  of  the  agony  of  flesh,  are  beyond  the  baser  mis- 
chances: partaking  of  them  indeed,  but  sublimely.  Now 
Redworth  believed  in  the  soul  of  Diana.  For  him  it 
burned,  and  it  was  a  celestial  radiance  about  her,  un- 
quenched  by  her  shifting  fortunes,  her  wilfulnesses,  and, 
it  might  be,  errors.  She  was  a  woman  and  weak;  that  is, 
not  trained  for  strength.  She  was  a  soul;  therefore  per- 
petually pointing  to  growth  in  purification.  He  felt  it, 
and  even  discerned  it  of  her,  if  he  could  not  have  phrased 
it.  The  something  sovereignly  characteristic  that  aspired 
in  Diana  enchained  him.  With  her,  or  rather  with  his 
thought  of  her  soul,  he  understood  the  right  union  of 
women  and  men,  from  the  roots  to  the  flowering  heights 
of  that  rare  graft.  She  gave  him  comprehension  of  the 
meaning  of  love:  a  word  in  many  mouths,  not  often  ex- 
plained. With  her,  wound  in  his  idea  of  her,  he  perceived 
it  to  signify  a  new  start  in  our  existence,  a  finer  shoot  of 
the  tree  stoutly  planted  in  good  gross  earth;  the  senses 
running  their  live  sap,  and  the  minds  companioned,  and 
the  spirits  made  one  by  the  whole-natured  conjunction. 
In  sooth,  a  happy  prospect  for  the  sons  and  daughters  of 

23 


854  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Earth,  divinely  indicating  more  than  happiness :  the  speed- 
ing of  us,  compact  of  what  we  are,  between  the  ascetic 
rocks  and  the  sensual  whirlpools,  to  the  creation  of  certain 
nobler  races,  now  very  dimly  imagined. 

Singularly  enough,  the  man  of  these  feelings  was  far 
from  being  a  social  rebel.  His  Diana  conjured  them  forth 
in  relation  to  her,  but  was  not  on  his  bosom  to  enlighten 
him  generally.  His  notions  of  citizenship  tolerated  the 
female  Pharisees,  as  ladies  offering  us  an  excellent  social 
concrete  where  quicksands  abound,  and  without  quite  jus- 
tifying the  Lady  Wathins  and  Constance  Aspers  of  the 
world,  whose  virtues  he  could  set  down  to  accident  or  to 
acid  blood,  he  considered  them  supportable  and  estimable 
where  the  Mrs.  Fryar-Gunnetts  were  innumerable,  threat- 
ening to  become  a  majority;  as  they  will  constantly  do 
while  the  sisterhood  of  the  chaste  are  wattled  in  formalism 
and  throned  in  sourness. 

Thoughts  of  Diana  made  phantoms  of  the  reputable  and 
their  reverse  alike.  He  could  not  choose  but  think  of  her. 
She  was  free;  and  he  too;  and  they  were  as  distant  as  the 
horizon  sail  and  the  raft -floating  castaway.  Her  passion 
for  Dacier  might  have  burnt  out  her  heart.  And  at  present 
he  had  no  claim  to  visit  her,  dared  not  intrude.  He  would 
have  nothing  to  say,  if  he  went,  save  to  answer  questions 
upon  points  of  business :  as  to  which.  Lady  Dunstane  would 
certainly  summon  him  wiien  he  was  wanted. 

Eiding  in  the  park  on  a  frosty  morning,  he  came  upon 
Sir  Lukin,  who  looked  gloomy  and  inquired  for  news  of 
Diana  Warwick,  saying  that  his  wife  had  forbidden  him 
to  call  at  her  house  just  yet.  ^'  She 's  got  a  cold,  you 
know,"  said  Sir  Lukin;  adding,  "confoundedly  hard  on 
women!  —  eh?  Obliged  to  keep  up  a  show.  And  I'd 
swear,  by  all  that 's  hol}^,  Diana  Warwick  has  n't  a  spot, 
not  a  spot,  to  reproach  herself  with.  I  fancy  I  ought  to 
know  women  by  this  time.  And  look  here,  Eedworth, 
last  night  —  that  is,  I  mean,  yesterday  evening,  I  broke 
with  a  woman  —  a  lady  of  my  acquaintance,  you  know, 
because  she  would  go  on  scandal-mongering  about  Diana 
Warwick.  I  broke  with  her.  I  told  her  I  'd  have  out  any 
man  who  abused  Diana  Warwick,  and  I  broke  with  her. 
By  Jove !    Kedworth,  those   women   can  prove   spitfires. 


CHAiyrPIONS   OF  THE   STRICKEN  LADY  355 

They  We  bags  of  venom  under  their  tongues,  barley-sugar 
though  they  look  —  and  that 's  her  colour.  But  I  broke 
with  her  for  good.  I  doubt  if  I  shall  ever  call  on  her 
again.     And  in  point  of  fact,  I  won't." 

Mrs.  Fryar-Gunnett  was  described  in  the  colouring  of 
the  lady. 

Sir  Lukin,  after  some  further  remarks,  rode  on,  and 
Redworth  mused  on  a  moral  world  that  allows  a  woman 
of  Mrs.  Fryar-Gunnett's  like  to  hang  on  to  it,  and  to  cast 
a  stone  at  Diana;  forgetful,  in  his  championship,  that 
Diana  was  not  disallowed  a  similar  licence. 

When  he  saw  Emma  Dunstane,  some  days  later,  she  was 
in  her  carriage  driving,  as  she  said,  to  Lawyerland,  for  an 
interview  with  old  Mr.  Braddock,  on  her  friend's  affairs. 
He  took  a  seat  beside  her.  "No,  Tony  is  not  well,"  she 
replied  to  his  question,  under  the  veil  of  candour.  "  She 
is  recovering,  but  she  —  you  can  understand  —  suffered  a 
shock.  She  is  not  able  to  attend  to  business,  and  certain 
things  have  to  be  done." 

"I  used  to  be  her  man  of  business,"  Redworth  observed. 

"  She  speaks  of  your  kind  services.  This  is  mere  matter 
for  lawyers." 

"She  is  recovering?  " 

"  You  may  see  her  at  Copsley  next  week.  You  can  come 
down  on  Wednesdays  or  Saturdays?  " 

"Any  day.  Tell  her  I  want  her  opinion  upon  the  state 
of  things." 

"It  will  please  her;  but  you  will  have  to  describe  the 
state  of  things." 

Emma  feared  she  had  said  too  much.  She  tried  candour 
again  for  concealment.  "My  poor  Tony  has  been  struck 
down  low.  I  suppose  it  is  like  losing  a  diseased  limb:  — 
she  has  her  freedom,  at  the  cost  of  a  blow  to  the  system." 

"She  may  be  trusted  for  having  strength,"  said 
Redworth. 

"Yes."  Emma's  mild  monosyllable  was  presently  fol- 
lowed by  an  exclamation :  "  One  has  to  experience  the  irony 
of  Fate  to  comprehend  how  cruel  it  is  !  "  Then  she  remem- 
bered that  such  language  was  peculiarly  abhorrent  to  him. 

"Irony  of  Fate  !  "  he  echoed  her.  "I  thought  you  were 
above  that  literary  jargon. 


356  DIANA   OF  THE   CKOSSWAFS 

"And  I  thought  I  was:  or  thought  it  could  be  put  in  a 
dialect  practically  explicable,"  she  answered,  smiling  at 
the  lion  roused. 

"Upon  my  word,"  he  burst  out,  "I  should  like  to  write 
a  book  of  Fables,  showing  how  donkeys  get  into  grinding 
harness,  and  dogs  lose  their  bones,  and  fools  have  their 
sconces  cracked,  and  all  run  jabbering  of  the  irony  of  Fate, 
to  escape  the  annoyance  of  tracing  the  causes.  And  what 
are  they?  nine  times  out  of  ten,  plain  want  of  patience,  or 
some  debt  for  indulgence.  There's  a  subject : -^  let  some 
one  write.  Fables  in  illustration  of  the  irony  of  Fate :  and 
I  '11  undertake  to  tack-on  my  grandmother's  maxims  for  a 
moral  to  each  of  'em.  We  prate  of  that  irony  when  we 
slink  away  from  the  lesson  —  the  rod  we  conjure.  And 
you  to  talk  of  Fate  !  It 's  the  seed  we  sow,  individually 
or  collectively.  I  'm  bound-up  in  the  prosperity  of  the 
country,  and  if  the  ship  is  wrecked,  it  ruins  my  fortune, 
but  not  me,  unless  I  'm  bound-up  in  myself.  At  least  I 
hope  that's  my  case." 

He  apologized  for  intruding  Mr.  Thomas  Eedworth. 

His  hearer  looked  at  him,  thinking  he  required  a  more 
finely  pointed  gift  of  speech  for  the  ironical  tongue,  but 
relishing  the  tonic  directness  of  his  faculty  of  reason  while 
she  considered  that  the  application  of  the  phrase  might  be 
brought  home  to  him  so  as  to  render  "my  Grandmother's 
moral "  a  conclusion  less  comfortingly,  if  quite  intelligibly, 
summary.  And  then  she  thought  of  Tony's  piteous 
instance;  and  thinking  with  her  heart,  the  tears  insisted 
on  that  bitter  irony  of  the  heavens,  which  bestowed  the 
long-withheld  and  coveted  boon  when  it  was  empty  of 
value  or  was  but  as  a  handful  of  spices   to  a  shroud. 

Perceiving  the  moisture  in  her  look,  Eedworth  under- 
stood that  it  was  foolish  to  talk  rationally.  But  on  her 
return  to  her  beloved,  the  real  quality  of  the  man  had 
overcome  her  opposing  state  of  sentiment,  and  she  spoke 
of  him  with  an  iteration  and  throb  in  the  voice  that  set  a 
singular  query  whirring  round  Diana's  ears.  Her  senses 
were  too  heavy  for  a  suspicion. 


A  HEALTHY  MIND  DISTRAUGHT  357 

CHAPTEK  XXXVIII 

CONVALESCENCE    OF    A    HEALTHY    MIND    DISTRAUGHT 

From  an  abandonment  that  had  the  last  pleasure  of  life 
in  a  willingness  to  yield  it  up,  Diana  rose  with  her  friend's 
help  in  some  state  of  fortitude,  resembling  the  effort  of 
her  feet  to  bear  the  weight  of  her  body.  She  plucked  her 
courage  out  of  the  dust  to  which  her  heart  had  been  scat- 
tered, and  tasked  herself  to  walk  as  the  world  does.  But 
she  was  indisposed  to  compassionate  herself  in  the  manner 
of  the  burdened  world.  She  lashed  the  creature  who  could 
not  raise  a  head  like  others,  and  made  the  endurance  of 
torture  a  support,  such  as  the  pride  of  being  is  to  men. 
She  would  not  have  seen  any  similarity  to  pride  in  it; 
would  have  deemed  it  the  reverse.  It  was  in  fact  the  pain- 
ful gathering  of  the  atoms  composing  pride.  For  she 
had  not  only  suffered ;  she  had  done  wrongly :  and  when 
that  was  acknowledged,  by  the  light  of  her  sufferings  the 
wrong-doing  appeared  gigantic,  chorussing  eulogies  of  the 
man  she  had  thought  her  lover:  and  who  was  her  lover 
once,  before  the  crime  against  him.  In  the  opening  of 
her  bosom  to  Emma,  he  was  painted  a  noble  figure;  one 
of  those  that  Komance  delights  to  harass  for  the  sake  of 
ultimately  the  more  exquisitely  rewarding.  He  hated 
treachery:  she  had  been  guilty  of  doing  what  he  most 
hated.  She  glorified  him  for  the  incapacity  to  forgive;  it 
was  to  her  mind  godlike.     And  her  excuses  of  herself? 

At  the  first  confession,  she  said  she  had  none,  and  sul- 
lenly maintained  that  there  was  none  to  exonerate.  Little 
by  little  her  story  was  related  —  her  version  of  the  story: 
for  not  even  as  woman  to  woman,  friend  to  great-hearted 
friend,  pure  soul  to  soul,  could  Diana  tell  of  the  state  of 
shivering  abjection  in  which  Dacier  had  left  her  on  the 
fatal  night;  of  the  many  causes  conducing  to  it,  and  of 
the  chief.  That  was  an  unutterable  secret,  bound  by  all 
the  laws  of  feminine  civilization  not  to  be  betrayed.  Her 
excessive  self-abasement  and  exaltation  of  him  who  had 


358  DIANA  OF  THE   CEOSSWAYS 

struck  her  down,  rendered  it  difficult  to  be  understood; 
and  not  till  Emma  had  revolved  it  and  let  it  ripen  in  the 
mind  some  days  could  she  perceive  with  any  clearness  her 
Tony's  motives,  or  mania.  The  very  word  Money  thick- 
ened the  riddle:  for  Tony  knew  that  her  friend's  purse 
was  her  own  to  dip  in  at  her  pleasure ;  yet  she,  to  escape 
so  small  an  obligation,  had  committed  the  enormity  for 
which  she  held  the  man  blameless  in  spurning  her. 

"You  see  what  I  am,  Emmy,"  Diana  said. 

"What  I  do  not  see,  is  that  he  had  grounds  for  striking 
so  cruelly." 

"I  proved  myself  unworthy  of  him." 

But  does  a  man  pretending  to  love  a  woman  cut  at  one 
blow,  for  such  a  cause,  the  ties  uniting  her  to  him  ?  Un- 
worthiness  of  that  kind  is  not  commonly  the  capital 
offence  in  love.  —  Tony's  deep  prostration  and  her  resplen- 
dent picture  of  her  judge  and  executioner,  kept  Emma 
questioning  within  herself.  Gradually  she  became  enlight- 
ened enough  to  distinguish  in  the  man  a  known,  if  not 
common,  type  of  the  externally  soft  and  polished,  inter- 
nally hard  and  relentless,  who  are  equal  to  the  trials  of 
love  only  as  long  as  favouring  circumstances  and  seemings 
nurse  the  fair  object  of  their  courtship. 

Her  thoughts  recurred  to  the  madness  driving  Tony  to 
betray  the  secret ;  and  the  ascent  unhelped  to  get  a  survey 
of  it  and  her  and  the  conditions,  was  mountainous.  She  toiled 
up  but  to  enter  the  regions  of  cloud ;  sure  nevertheless  that 
the  obscurity  was  penetrable  and  excuses  to  be  discovered 
somewhere.  Having  never  wanted  money  herself,  she  was 
unable  perfectly  to  realize  the  urgency  of  the  need:  she 
began,  however,  to  comprehend  that  the  very  eminent 
gentleman,  before  whom  all  human  creatures  were  to  bow 
in  humility,  had  for  an  extended  term  considerably  added 
to  the  expenses  of  Tony's  household,  by  inciting  her  to 
give  those  little  dinners  to  his  political  supporters,  and 
bringing  comrades  perpetually  to  supper-parties,  careless 
of  how  it  might  affect  her  character  and  her  purse.  Surely 
an  honourable  man  was  bound  to  her  in  honour  ?  Tony's 
remark :  "  I  have  the  reptile  in  me,  dear,"  —  her  exaggera- 
tion of  the  act,  in  her  resigned  despair,  —  was  surely  no 
justification  for  his  breaking  from  her,  even  though  he  had 


A   HEALTHY  MIND  DlSTIiAUGHT  359 

discovered  a  vestige  of  the  common  "reptile,"  to  leave  her 
with  a  stain  on  her  name  ?  —  There  would  not  have  been  a 
question  about  it  if  Tony  had  not  exalted  him  so  loftily, 
refusing,  in  visible  pain,  to  hear  him  blamed. 

Danvers  had  dressed  a  bed  for  Lady  Dunstane  in  her 
mistress's  chamber,  where  often  during  the  night  Emma 
caught  a  sound  of  stifled  weeping  or  the  long  falling 
breath  of  wakeful  grief.  One  night  she  asked  whether 
Tony  would  like  to  have  her  by  her  side. 

"  No,  dear,"  was  the  answer  in  the  dark ;  "  but  you  know 
my  old  pensioners,  the  blind  fifer  and  his  wife;  I've  been 
thinking  of  them." 

"They  were  paid  as  they  passed  down  the  street  yester- 
day, my  love." 

"Yes,  dear,  1  hope  so.  But  he  flourishes  his  tune  so 
absurdly.  I  Ve  been  thinking,  that  is  the  part  I  have 
played,  instead  of  doing  the  female's  duty  of  handing 
round  the  tin-cup  for  pennies.     I  won't  cry  any  more." 

She  sighed  and  turned  to  sleep,  leaving  Emma  to  dis- 
burden her  heart  in  tears. 

For  it  seemed  to  her  that  Tony's  intellect  was  weakened. 
She  not  merely  abased  herself  and  exalted  Dacier  pre- 
posterously, she  had  sunk  her  intelligence  in  her  sensa- 
tions :  a  state  that  she  used  to  decry  as  the  sin  of  mankind, 
the  origin  of  error  and  blood. 

Strangely  too,  the  proposal  came  from  her,  or  the  sugges- 
tion of  it,  notwithstanding  her  subjectedness  to  the  nerves, 
that  she  should  show  her  face  in  public.  She  said :  "  I  shall 
have  to  run  about,  Emmy,  when  I  can  fancy  I  am  able  to 
rattle  up  to  the  old  mark.  At  present,  I  feel  like  a  wrestler 
who  has  had  a  fall.  As  soon  as  the  stiffness  is  over,  it 's 
best  to  make  an  appearance,  for  the  sake  of  one's  backers, 
though  I  shall  never  be  in  the  wrestling  ring  again." 

"  That  is  a  good  decision  —  when  you  feel  quite  yourself, 
dear  Tony,"  Emma  replied. 

'*!  dare  say  I  have  disgraced  my  sex,  but  not  as  they 
suppose.  I  feel  my  new  self  already,  and  can  make  the 
poor  brute  go  through  fire  on  behalf  of  the  old.  What  is 
the  task  ?  —  merely  to  drive  a  face  !  " 

"It  is  not  known." 

"  It  will  be  known." 


360  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

*'  But  this  is  a  sealed  secret." 

"Nothing  is  a  secret  that  has  been  spoken.  It's  in  the 
air,  and  I  have  to  breathe  to  live  by  it.  And  I  would 
rather  it  were  out.  *  She  betrayed  him/  Rather  that, 
than  have  them  think  —  anything !  They  will  exclaim, 
How  could  she  I  I  have  been  unable  to  answer  it  to 
you  —  my  own  heart.  How  ?  Oh !  our  weakness  is  the 
swiftest  dog  to  hunt  us ;  we  cannot  escape  it.  But  I 
have  the  answer  for  them,  that  I  trust  with  my  whole 
soul  none  of  them  would  have  done  the  like." 

"None,  my  Tony,  would  have  taken  it  to  the  soul  as 
you  do." 

"  I  talk,  dear.  If  I  took  it  honestly,  I  should  be  dumb, 
soon  dust.  The  moment  we  begin  to  speak,  the  guilty 
creature  is  running  for  cover.  She  could  not  otherwise 
exist.     I  am  sensible  of  evasion  when  I  open  my  lips." 

"But  Tony  has  told  me  all." 

"  I  think  I  have.  But  if  you  excuse  my  conduct,  I  am 
certain  I  have  not." 

"Dear  girl,  accounting  for  it  is  not  the  same  as 
excusing." 

"Who  can  account  for  it!  I  was  caught  in  a  whirl  — 
Oh !  nothing  supernatural :  my  weakness  ;  which  it  pleases 
me  to  call  a  madness  —  shift  the  niuety-ninth !  When  I 
drove  down  that  night  to  Mr.  Tonans,  I  am  certain  I  had 
my  clear  wits,  but  I  telt  like  a  bolt.  I  saw  things,  but  at 
too  swift  a  rate  for  the  conscience  of  them.  Ah  !  let  never 
Necessity  draw  the  bow  of  our  weakness :  it  is  the  soul 
that  is  winged  to  its  perdition.  I  remember  I  was  writing 
a  story,  named  The  Man  of  Two  Minds.  I  shall  sign  it 
By  The  Wommi  of  Two  Natures.  If  ever  it  is  finished. 
Capacity  for  thinking  should  precede  the  act  of  writing. 
It  should ;  I  do  not  say  that  it  does.  Capacity  for  assimi- 
lating the  public  taste  and  reproducing  it  is  the  com- 
monest. The  stuff  is  perishable,  but  it  pays  us  for  our 
labour,  and  in  so  doing  saves  us  from  becoming  tricksters. 
Now  I  can  see  that  Mr.  Redworth  had  it  in  that  big  head 
of  his  —  the  authoress  outliving  her  income!" 

"  He  dared  not  speak." 

"  Why  did  he  not  dare  ?  " 

"  Would  it  have  checked  you  ?  " 


A  HEALTHY  MIND  DISTRAUGHT  861 

**  I  was  a  shot  out  of  a  gun,  and  I  am  glad  he  did  not 
stand  in  my  way.  What  power  charged  the  gun,  is  another 
question,  Dada  used  to  say,  that  it  is  the  devil's  master- 
stroke to  get  us  to  accuse  him.  *  So  fare  ye  well,  old  Nickie 
Ben.'  My  dear,  I  am  a  black  sheep;  a  creature  with  a 
spotted  reputation ;  I  must  wash  and  wash ;  and  not  with 
water — with  sulphur-flames."  She  sighed.  "I  am  down 
there  where  they  burn.  You  should  have  let  me  lie  and 
die.     You  were  not  kind.     I  was  going  quietly." 

"M.y  love!"  cried  Emma,  overborne  by  a  despair  that 
she  traced  to  the  woman's  concealment  of  her  bleeding 
heart,  — "  you  live  for  me.  Do  set  your  mind  on  that. 
Think  of  what  you  are  bearing,  as  your  debt  to  Emma. 
Will  you?" 

Tony  bowed  her  head  mechanically. 

"But  I  am  in  love  with  King  Death,  and  must  confess 
it,"  she  said.  "That  hideous  eating  you  forced  on  me, 
snatched  me  from  him.  And  I  feel  that  if  I  had  gone,  I 
should  have  been  mercifully  forgiven  by  everybody." 

"Except  by  me,"  said  Emma,  embracing  her.  "Tony 
would  have  left  her  friend  for  her  last  voyage  in  mourning. 
And  my  dearest  will  live  to  know  happiness.'' 

"I  have  no  more  belief  in  it,  Emmy." 

"  The  mistake  of  the  world  is  to  think  happiness  possible 
to  the  senses." 

"  Yes ;  we  distil  that  fine  essence  through  the  senses  ; 
and  the  act  is  called  the  pain  of  life.  It  is  the  death  of 
them.  So  much  I  understand  of  what  our  existence  must 
be.     But  I  may  grieve  for  having  done  so  little." 

"  That  is  the  sound  grief,  with  hope  at  the  core  —  not  in 
love  with  itself  and  wretchedly  mortal,  as  we  find  self  is 
under  every  shape  it  takes ;  especially  the  chief  one." 

"Name  it." 

"It  is  best  named  Amor." 

There  was  a  writhing  in  the  frame  of  the  hearer,  for  she 
did  want  Love  to  be  respected ;  not  shadowed  by  her  mis- 
fortune. Her  still-flushed  senses  protested  on  behalf  of  the 
eternalness  of  the  passion,  and  she  was  obliged  to  think 
Emma's  cold  condemnatory  intellect  came  of  the  no-knowl- 
edge of  it. 

A  letter  from  Mr.  Tonans,  containing  an  enclosure,  was  a 


B62  DIANA  OF  THE   CEOSSWAYS 

sharp  trial  of  Diana's  endurance  of  the  irony  of  Fate.  She 
had  spoken  of  the  irony  in  allusion  to  her  freedom.  Now 
that,  according  to  a  communication  from  her  lawyers,  she 
was  independent  of  the  task  of  writing,  the  letter  which 
paid  the  price  of  her  misery  bruised  her  heavily. 

•'  Kead  it  and  tear  it  all  to  strips,"  she  said  in  an  abhor- 
rence to  Emma,  who  rejoined  :  ''  Shall  I  go  at  once  and  see 
him  ?  " 

"  Can  it  serve  any  end?  But  throw  it  into  the  fire.  Oh ! 
no  simulation  of  virtue.  There  was  not,  I  think,  a  stipulated 
return  for  what  I  did.  But  I  perceive  clearly  —  I  can  read 
only  by  events  —  that  there  was  an  understanding.  You 
behold  it.  I  went  to  him  to  sell  it.  He  thanks  me,  says  I 
served  the  good  cause  well.  I  have  not  that  consolation. 
If  I  had  thought  of  the  cause  —  of  anything  high,  it  would 
have  arrested  me.     On  the  fire  with  it !  " 

The  letter  and  square  slip  were  consumed.  Diana 
watched  the  blackening  papers. 

^'  So  they  cease  their  sinning,  Emmy  ;  and  as  long  as  I 
am  in  torment,  I  may  hope  for  grace.  We  talked  of  the 
irony.     It  means,  the  pain  of  fire." 

*'l  spoke  of  the  irony  to  Kedworth,'*  said  Emma;  "inci- 
dentally, of  course." 

"And  he  fumed?" 

"  He  is  really  not  altogether  the  Mr.  Cuthbert  Dering  of 
your  caricature.  He  is  never  less  than  acceptably  rational. 
i  won't  repeat  his  truisms  ;  but  he  said,  or  I  deduced  from 
what  he  said,  that  a  grandmother's  maxims  would  expound 
the  enigma." 

"  Probably  the  simple  is  the  deep,  in  relation  to  the 
mysteries  of  life,"  said  Diana,  whose  wits  had  been  pricked 
to  a  momentary  activity  by  the  letter.  "  He  behaves  wisely ; 
so  perhaps  we  are  bound  to  take  his  words  for  wisdom. 
Much  nonsense  is  talked  and  written,  and  he  is  one  of  the 
world's  reserves,  who  need  no  more  than  enrolling,  to  make 
a  sturdy  phalanx  of  common  sense.  It's  a  pity  they  are 
not  enlisted  and  drilled  to  express  themselves."  She 
relapsed.  "  But  neither  he  nor  any  of  them  could  under- 
stand my  case ! " 

"  He  puts  the  idea  of  an  irony  down  to  the  guilt  of  im- 
patience, Tony." 


A  SHORT  EXCtJRSION    IN   ANTI-CLIMAX  363 

"  Could  there  be  a  keener  irony  than  that  ?  A  friend  of 
Dada's  waited  patiently  for  a  small  fortune,  and  when  it 
arrived,  he  was  a  worn-out  man,  just  assisted  to  go  decently 
to  his  grave." 

*'  But  he  may  have  gained  in  spirit  by  his  patient 
waiting." 

"  Oh !  true.  We  are  warmer  if  we  travel  on  foot  sun- 
ward, but  it  is  a  discovery  that  we  are  colder  if  we  take  to 
ballooning  upward.  The  material  good  reverses  its  benefits 
the  more  nearly  we  clasp  it.  All  life  is  a  lesson  that  we 
live  to  enjoy  but  in  the  spirit.  I  will  brood  on  your 
saying." 

"It  is  your  own  saying,  silly  Tony,  as  the  only  things 
worth  saying  always  are !  "  exclaimed  Emma,  as  she  smiled 
happily  to  see  her  friend's  mind  reviving,  though  it  was 
faintly  and  in  the  dark. 


CHAPTER  XXXIX 

OF   NATURE    WITH    ONE    OF    HER    CULTIVATED    DAUGHTERS 
AND    A    SHORT   EXCURSION    IN    ANTI-CLIMAX 

A  MIND  that  after  a  long  season  of  oblivion  in  pain  re- 
turns to  wakefulness  without  a  keen  edge  for  the  world,  is 
much  in  danger  of  souring  permanently.  Diana's  love  of 
nature  saved  her  from  the  dire  mischance  during  a  two 
months'  residence  at  Copsley,  by  stupefying  her  senses  to  a 
state  like  the  barely  conscious  breathing  on  the  verge  of 
sleep.  February  blew  South-west  for  the  pairing  of  the 
birds.  A  broad  warm  wind  rolled  clouds  of  every  ambiguity 
of  form  in  magnitude  over  peeping  azure,  or  skimming 
upon  lakes  of  blue  and  lightest  green,  or  piling  the  amphi< 
theatre  for  majestic  sunset.  Or  sometimes  those  daughters 
of  the  wind  flew  linked  and  low,  semi-purple,  threatening 
the  shower  they  retained  and  teaching  gloom  to  rouse  a 
songful  nest  in  the  bosom  of  the  viewer.  Sometimes  they 
were  April,  variable  to  soar  with  rain-skirts  and  sink  with 
sun-shafts.     Or   they  drenched    wood  and   field  for  a  day 


864  DIANA   OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

and  opened  on  the  high  South-western  star.  Daughters  of 
the  wind,  but  shifty  daughters  of  this  wind  of  the  drop- 
ping sun,  they  have  to  be  watched  to  be  loved  in  their 
transformations. 

Diana  had  Arthur  Khodes  and  her  faithful  Leander  for 
walking  companions.  If  Arthur  said :  "  Such  a  day  would 
be  considered  melancholy  by  London  people/'  she  thanked 
him  in  her  heart,  as  a  benefactor  who  had  revealed  to  her 
things  of  the  deepest.  The  simplest  were  her  food.  Thus 
does  Nature  restore  us,  by  drugging  the  brain  and  making 
her  creature  confidingly  animal  for  its  new  growth.  She 
imagined  herself  to  have  lost  the  power  to  think ;  certainly 
she  had  not  the  striving  or  the  wish.  Exercise  of  her 
limbs  to  reach  a  point  of  prospect,  and  of  her  ears  and  eyes 
to  note  what  bird  had  piped,  what  flower  was  out  on  the 
banks,  and  the  leaf  of  what  tree  it  was  that  lay  beneath  the 
budding,  satiated  her  daily  desires.  She  gathered  unknow- 
ingly a  sheaf  of  landscapes,  images,  keys  of  dreamed 
horizons,  that  opened  a  world  to  her  at  any  chance  breath 
altering  shape  or  hue  :  a  different  world  from  the  one  of 
her  old  ambition.  Her  fall  had  brought  her  renovatingly 
to  earth,  and  the  saving  naturalness  of  the  woman  recreated 
her  childlike,  with  shrouded  recollections  of  her  strange 
taste  of  life  behind  her ;  with  a  tempered  fresh  blood  to 
enjoy  aimlessly,  and  what  would  erewhile  have  been  a  bar- 
renness to  her  sensibilities. 

In  time  the  craving  was  evolved  for  positive  knowledge, 
and  shells  and  stones  and  weeds  were  deposited  on  the 
library-table  at  Copsley,  botanical  and  geological  books 
comparingly  examined,  Emma  Dunstane  always  eager  to 
assist;  for  the  samples  wafted  her  into  the  heart  of  the 
woods.  Poor  Sir  Lukin  tried  three  days  of  their  society, 
and  was  driven  away  headlong  to  Club-life.  He  sent  down 
Kedworth,  with  whom  the  walks  of  the  zealous  inquirers 
were  profitable,  though  Diana,  in  acknowledging  it  to  her- 
self, reserved  a  decided  preference  for  her  foregone  ethereal 
mood,  larger,  and  untroubled  by  the  presence  of  a  man. 
The  suspicion  Emma  had  sown  was  not  excited  to  an  alarm- 
ing activity ;  bnt  she  began  to  question :  could  the  best  of 
men  be  simply  a  woman's  friend  ?  —  was  not  long  service 
rather  less  than  a  proof  of  friendship  ?     She  could  be  blind 


A   SHORT   EXCURSION  IN  ANTI-CLIMAX  365 

when  her  heart  was  on  fire  for  another.  Her  passion  for 
her  liberty,  however,  received  no  ominous  warning  to  look 
to  the  defences.  He  was  the  same  blunt  speaker,  and 
knotted  his  brows  as  queerly  as  ever  at  Arthur,  in  a  trans- 
parent calculation  of  how  this  fellow  meant  to  gain  his 
livelihood.  She  wilfully  put  it  to  the  credit  of  Arthur's 
tact  that  his  elder  was  amiable,  without  denying  her  debt 
to  the  good  man  for  leaving  her  illness  and  her  appearance 
unmentioned.  He  forebore  even  to  scan  her  features. 
Diana's  wan  contemplativeness,  in  which  the  sparkle  of 
meaning  slowly  rose  to  flash,  as  we  see  a  bubble  rising  from 
the  deeps  of  cr3^stal  waters,  caught  at  his  heart  while  he 
talked  his  matter-of-fact.  But  her  instinct  of  a  present 
safety  was  true.  She  and  Arthur  discovered  —  and  it  set 
her  first  meditating  whether  she  did  know  the  man  so  very 
accurately  —  that  he  had  printed,  for  private  circulation, 
when  at  Harrow  School,  a  little  book,  a  record  of  his  ob- 
servations in  nature.  Lady  Dunstane  was  the  casual  be- 
trayer. He  shrugged  at  the  nonsense  of  a  boy's  publishing ; 
anybody's  publishing  he  held  for  a  doubtful  proof  of  sanity. 
His  excuse  was,  that  he  had  not  published  opinions.  Let 
us  observe,  and  assist  in  our  small  sphere ;  not  come 
mouthing  to  the  footlights ! 

"  We  retire,"  Diana  said,  for  herself  and  Arthur. 

"  The  wise  thing,  is  to  avoid  the  position  that  enforces 
publishing,"  said  he,  to  the  discomposure  of  his  raw 
junior. 

In  the  fields  he  was  genially  helpful ;  commending  them 
to  the  study  of  the  South-west  wind,  if  they  wanted  to 
forecast  the  weather  and  understand  the  climate  of  our 
country.  "  We  have  no  Seasons,  or  only  a  shuffle  of  them. 
Old  calendars  give  seven  months  of  the  year  to  the  South- 
west, and  that 's  about  the  average.  Count  on  it,  you  may 
generally  reckon  what  to  expect.  When  you  don't  have 
the  excess  for  a  year  or  two,  you  are  drenched  the  year 
following."  He  knew  every  bird  by  its  flight  and  its  pipe, 
habits,  tricks,  hints  of  sagacity  homely  with  the  original 
human  ;  and  his  remarks  on  the  sensitive  life  of  trees  and 
herbs  were  a  spell  to  his  thirsty  hearers.  Something  of 
astronomy  he  knew ;  but  in  relation  to  that  science,  he  sank 
his  voice,  touchingly  to  Diana,  who  felt  drawn  to  kinship 


366  DIANA   OF   THE  CROSSWAYS 

witli  him  when  he  had  a  pupil's  tone.  An  allusion  by 
Arthur  to  the  poetical  work  of  Aratus,  led  to  a  memorably 
pleasant  evening's  discourse  upon  the  long  reading  of  the 
stars  by  these  our  mortal  eyes.  Altogether  the  mind  of 
the  practical  man  became  distinguishable  to  them  as  that 
of  a  plain  brother  of  the  poetic.  Diana  said  of  him  to 
Arthur  :  "  He  does  not  supply  me  with  similes ;  he  points 
to  the  source  of  them."  Arthur,  with  envy  of  the  man 
of  positive  knowledge,  disguised  an  unstrung  heart  in 
agreeing. 

Redworth  alluded  passingly  to  the  condition  of  public 
affairs.  Neither  of  them  replied.  Diana  was  wondering 
how  one  who  perused  the  eternal  of  nature  should  lend  a 
thought  to  the  dusty  temporary  of  the  world.  Subsequently 
she  reflected  that  she  was  asking  him  to  confine  his  great 
male  appetite  to  the  nibble  of  bread  which  nourished  her 
immediate  sense  of  life.  Her  reflections  were  thin  as  mist, 
coming  and  going  like  the  mist,  with  no  direction  upon  her 
brain,  if  they  sprang  from  it.  When  he  had  gone,  welcome 
though  Arthur  had  seen  him  to  be,  she  rebounded  to  a 
broader  and  cheerfuller  liveliness.  Arthur  was  flattered  by 
an  idea  of  her  casting  off  incubus  —  a  most  worthy  gentle- 
man, and  a  not  perfectly  sympathetic  associate.  Her  eyes 
had  their  lost  light  in  them,  her  step  was  brisker ;  she 
challenged  him  to  former  games  of  conversation,  excur- 
sions in  blank  verse  here  and  there,  as  the  mood  dictated. 
They  amused  themselves,  and  Emma  too.  She  revelled  in 
seeing  Tony's  younger  face  and  hearing  some  of  her  natural 
outbursts.  That  Dacier  never  could  have  been  the  man  for 
her,  would  have  compressed  and  subjected  her,  and  inflicted 
a  further  taste  of  bondage  in  marriage,  she  was  assured. 
She  hoped  for  the  day  when  Tony  would  know  it,  and 
haply  that  another,  whom  she  little  comprehended,  was  her 
rightful  mate. 

March  continued  South-westerly  and  grew  rainier,  as 
Redworth  had  foretold,  bidding  them  look  for  gales  and 
storm,  and  then  the  change  of  wind.  It  came,  after  wet- 
tings of  a  couple  scorning  the  refuge  of  dainty  townsfolk 
under  umbrellas,  and  proud  of  their  likeness  to  dripping 
wayside  wildflowers.  Arthur  stayed  at  Copsley  for  a  week 
of  the  Crisp  North-easter  j  and  what  was  it,  when  he  had 


A  SHOKT   EXCURSION  IN   ANTI-CLIMAX  367 

taken  his  leave,  that  brought  Tony  home  from  her  solitary 
walk  in  dejection  ?  It  could  not  be  her  seriously  regretting 
the  absence  of  the  youthful  companion  she  had  parted  with 
gaily,  appointing  a  time  for  another  meeting  on  the  heights, 
and  recommending  him  to  repair  idle  hours  with  strenuous 
work.  The  fit  passed  and  was  not  explained.  The  winds 
are  sharp  with  memory.  The  hard  shrill  wind  crowed  to 
her  senses  of  an  hour  on  the  bleak  sands  of  the  French 
coast :  the  beginning  of  the  curtained  misery,  inscribed  as 
her  happiness.  She  was  next  day  prepared  for  her  term  in 
London  with  Emma,  who  promised  her  to  make  an  expedi- 
tion at  the  end  of  it  by  way  of  holiday,  to  see  The  Cross- 
ways,  which  Mr.  Redworth  said  was  not  tenanted. 

"  You  won't  go  through  it  like  a  captive  ?  "  said  Emma. 

**  I  don't  like  it,  dear,"  Diana  put  up  a  comic  mouth. 
"  The  debts  we  owe  ourselves  are  the  hardest  to  pay.  That 
is  the  discovery  of  advancing  age  :  and  I  used  to  imagine  it 
was  quite  the  other  way.  But  they  are  the  debts  of  honour, 
imperative.  ■  I  shall  go  through  it  grandly,  you  will  see. 
If  I  am  stopped  at  my  first  recreancy  and  turned  directly 
the  contrary  way,  I  think  I  have  courage." 

"You  will  not  fear  to  meet  .  .  .  anyone  ?  "  Emma  said. 

"  The  world  and  all  it  contains  !  I  am  robust,  eager  for 
the  fray,  an  Amazon,  a  brazen-faced  hussy.  Fear  and  I 
have  parted.  I  shall  not  do  you  discredit.  Besides  you 
intend  to  have  me  back  here  with  you  ?  And  besides 
again,  I  burn  to  make  a  last  brave  appearance.  I  have  not 
outraged  the  world,  dear  Emmy,  whatever  certain  creatures 
in  it  may  fancy." 

She  had  come  out  of  her  dejectedness  with  a  shrewder 
view  of  Dacier;  equally  painful,  for  it  killed  her  romance, 
and  changed  the  garden  of  their  companionship  in  imagina- 
tion to  a  waste.  Her  clearing  intellect  prompted  it,  whilst 
her  nature  protested,  and  reviled  her  to  uplift  him.  He 
had  loved  her.  "  I  shall  die  knowing  that  a  man  did  love 
me  once,"  she  said  to  her  widowed  heart,  and  set  herself 
blushing  and  blanching.  But  the  thought  grew  inveterate  : 
"  He  could  not  bear  much."  And  in  her  quick  brain  it  shot 
up  a  crop  of  similitudes  for  the  quality  of  that  man's  love. 
She  shuddered,  as  at  a  swift  cleaving  of  cold  steel.  He  had 
not  given  her  a  chance  j  he  had  not  replied  to  her  letter 


368  DIANA  OF   THE  CROSS  WAYS 

written  with  the  pen  dipped  in  her  heart's  blood  ;  he  must 
have  gone  straight  away  to  the  woman  he  married.  This 
after  almost  justifying  the  scandalous  world  :  —  after  .  .  . 
She  realized  her  sensations  of  that  night  when  the  house- 
door  had  closed  on  him ;  her  feeling  of  lost  sovereignty, 
degradation,  feminine  danger,  friendlessness  :  and  she  was 
unaware,  and  never  knew,  nor  did  the  world  ever  know, 
what  cunning  had  inspired  the  frosty  Cupid  to  return  to 
her  and  be  warmed  by  striking  a  bargain  for  his  weighty 
secret.  She  knew  too  well  that  she  was  not  of  the  snows 
which  do  not  melt,  however  high  her  conceit  of  herself 
might  place  her.  Happily  she  now  stood  out  of  the  sun, 
in  a  bracing  temperature,  Polar ;  and  her  compassion  for 
women  was  deeply  sisterly  in  tenderness  and  understanding. 
She  spoke  of  it  to  Emma  as  her  gain. 

"  I  have  not  seen  that  you  required  to  suffer  to  be  con- 
siderate," Emma  said. 

"  It  is  on  my  conscience  that  I  neglected  Mary  Paynham, 
among  others  —  and  because  you  did  not  take  to  her, 
Emmy." 

"  The  reading  of  it  appears  to  me,  that  she  has  neglected 
you." 

"  She  was  not  in  my  confidence,  and  so  I  construe  it  as 
delicacy.     One  never  loses  by  believing  the  best." 

"  If  one  is  not  duped." 

"  Expectations  dupe  us,  not  trust.  The  light  of  every 
soul  burns  upward.  Of  course,  most  of  them  are  candles  in 
the  wind.  Let  us  allow  for  atmospheric  disturbance.  Now 
I  thank  you,  dear,  for  bringing  me  back  to  life.  I  see  that 
I  was  really  a  selfish  suicide,  because  I  feel  I  have  power 
to  do  some  good,  and  belong  to  the  army.  When  we  are 
beginning  to  reflect,  as  I  do  now,  on  a  recovered  basis  of 
pure  health,  we  have  the  world  at  the  dawn  and  know  we 
are  young  in  it,  with  great  riches,  great  things  gained  and 
greater  to  achieve.  Personally  I  behold  a  queer  little 
wriggling  worm  for  myself  ;  but  as  one  of  the  active  world 
I  stand  high  and  shapely  ;  and  the  very  thought  of  doing 
work,  is  like  a  draught  of  the  desert-springs  to  me.  In- 
stead of  which,  I  have  once  more  to  go  about  presenting 
my  face  to  vindicate  my  character.  Mr.  E-edworth  would 
admit  no  irony  in  that !     At  all  events,  it  is  anti-climax," 


A   SHORT   EXCURSION   IN   ANTI-CLIMAX  369 

"  I  forgot  to  tell  you,  Tony,  you  have  been  proposed 
for,"  said  Emma ;  and  there  was  a  rush  of  savage  colour 
over  Tony's  cheeks. 

Her  apparent  apprehensions  were  relieved  by  hearing  the 
name  of  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith. 

"  My  poor  dear  countryman  !  And  he  thought  me  worthy, 
did  he  ?  Some  day,  when  we  are  past  his  repeating  it,  I  '11 
thank  him." 

The  fact  of  her  smiling  happily  at  the  narration  of  Sul- 
livan Smith's  absurd  proposal  by  mediatrix,  proved  to 
Emma  how  much  her  nature  thirsted  for  the  smallest  sup- 
port in  her  self-esteem. 

The  second  campaign  of  London  was  of  bad  augury  at 
the  commencement,  owing  to  the  ridiculous  intervention  of 
a  street-organ,  that  ground  its  pipes  in  a  sprawling  roar 
of  one  of  the  Puritani  marches,  just  as  the  carriage  was 
landing  them  at  the  door  of  her  house.  The  notes  were 
harsh,  dissonant,  drunken,  interlocked  and  horribly  torn 
asunder,  intolerable  to  ears  not  keen  to  extract  the  tune 
through  dreadful  memories.  Diana  sat  startled  and  para- 
lyzed. The  melody  crashed  a  revival  of  her  days  with 
i)acier,  as  in  gibes ;  and  yet  it  reached  to  her  heart.  She 
imagined  a  Providence  that  was  trying  her  on  the  thresh- 
old, striking  at  her  feebleness.  She  had  to  lock  herself  in 
her  room  for  an  hour  of  deadly  abandonment  to  misery, 
resembling  the  run  of  poison  through  her  blood,  before  she 
could  bear  to  lift  eyes  on  her  friend ;  to  whom  subsequently 
she  said :  "  Emmy,  there  are  wounds  that  cut  sharp  as  the 
enchanter's  sword,  and  we  don't  know  we  are  in  halves  till 
some  rough  old  intimate  claps  us  on  the  back,  merely  to 
ask  us  how  we  are !  I  have  to  join  myself  together  again, 
as  well  as  I  can.  It 's  done,  dear ;  but  don't  notice  the 
cement." 

"  You  will  be  brave,"  Emma  petitioned. 

"  I  long  to  show  you  I  will." 

The  meeting  with  those  who  could  guess  a  portion  of  her 
story,  did  not  disconcert  her.  To  Lady  Pennon  and  Lady 
Singleby,  she  was  the  brilliant  Diana  of  her  nominal  lumi- 
nary issuing  from  cloud.  Face  and  tongue,  she  was  the 
same ;  and  once  in  the  stream,  she  soon  gathered  its  current 
topics  and  scattered  her  arrowy  phrases.     Lady  Pennon  ran 

24 


370  DIANA   OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

about  with  them,  declaring  that  the  beautiful  speaker,  if 
ever  down,  was  up,  and  up  to  her  finest  mark.  Mrs.  Fryar- 
Gunnett  had  then  become  the  blazing  regnant  antisocial 
star ;  a  distresser  of  domesticity,  the  magnetic  attraction 
in  the  spirituous  flames  of  that  wild  snapdragon  bowl,  called 
the  Upper  class  ;  and  she  was  angelically  blonde,  a  straw- 
coloured  Beauty.  "  A  lovely  wheatsheaf,  if  the  head  were 
ripe,"  Diana  said  of  her. 

"  Threshed,  says  her  fame,  my  dear,"  Lady  Pennon  re- 
plied, otherwise  allusive. 

"  A  wheatsheaf  of  contention  for  the  bread  of  wind," 
said  Diana,  thinking  of  foolish  Sir  Lukin ;  thoughtless  of 
talking  to  a  gossip. 

She  would  have  shot  a  lighter  dart,  had  she  meant  it  to 
fly  and  fix. 

Proclaim,  ye  classics,  what  minor  Goddess,  or  primal,  Iris 
or  Ate,  sped  straight  away  on  wing  to  the  empty  wheat- 
sheaf-ears  of  the  golden-visaged  Amabel  Pryar-Gunnett, 
daughter  of  Demeter  in  the  field  to  behold,  of  Aphrodite 
in  her  rosy  incendiarism  for  the  many  of  men ;  filling  that 
pearly  concave  with  a  perversion  of  the  uttered  speech, 
such  as  never  lady  could  have  repeated,  nor  man,  if  less 
than  a  reaping  harvester :  which  verily  for  women  to  hear, 
is  to  stamp  a  substantial  damnatory  verification  upon  the 
delivery  of  the  saying :  — 

"  Mrs.  Warwick  says  of  you,  that  you  're  a  bundle  of 
straws  for  everybody  and  bread  for  nobody." 

Or,  stranger  speculation,  through  what,  and  what  number 
of  conduits,  curious,  and  variously  colouring,  did  it  reach 
the  fair  Amabel  of  the  infant-in-cradle  smile,  in  that  de- 
formation of  the  original  utterance  !  To  pursue  the  thing, 
would  be  to  enter  the  subtersensual  perfumed  caverns  of  a 
Romance  of  Fashionable  Life,  with  no  hope  of  coming  back 
to  light,  other  than  by  tail  of  lynx,  like  the  great  Arabian 
seaman,  at  the  last  page  of  the  final  chapter.  A  prospec- 
tively popular  narrative  indeed  !  and  coin  to  reward  it,  and 
applause.  But  I  am  reminded  that  a  story  properly  closed 
on  the  marriage  of  the  heroine  Constance  and  her  young 
Minister  of  State,  has  no  time  for  conjuring  chemists'  bou- 
quet of  aristocracy  to  lure  the  native  taste.  When  we  have 
satisfied  English   sentiment,   our   task  is   done,   in   every 


A   SHORT   EXCURSION   IN   ANTI-CLIMAX  371 

branch  of  art,  I  hear :  and  it  will  account  to  posterity  for 
the  condition  of  the  branches.  Those  yet  wakeful  eccen- 
trics interested  in  such  a  person  as  Diana,  to  the  extent  of 
remaining  attentive  till  the  curtain  falls,  demand  of  me  to 
gather-up  the  threads  concerning  her :  which  my  gardener 
sweeping  his  pile  of  dead  leaves  before  the  storm  and 
night,  advises  me  to  do  speedily.  But  it  happens  that  her 
resemblance  to  her  sex  and  species  of  a  civilized  period 
plants  the  main  threads  in  her  bosom.  Rogues  and  a  po- 
liceman, or  a  hurried  change  of  front  of  all  the  actors,  are 
not  a  part  of  our  slow  machinery. 

Nor  is  she  to  show  herself  to  advantage.  Only  those 
who  read  her  woman's  blood  and  character  with  the  head, 
will  care  for  Diana  of  the  Crossways  now  that  the  knot  of 
her  history  has  been  unravelled.  Some  little  love  they 
must  have  for  her  likewise  :  and  how  it  can  be  quickened 
on  behalf  of  a  woman  who  never  sentimentalizes  publicly, 
and  has  no  dolly-dolly  compliance,  and  muses  on  actual  life, 
and  fatigues  with  the  exercise  of  brains,  and  is  in  sooth  an 
alien :  a  princess  of  her  kind  and  time,  but  a  foreign  one, 
speaking  a  language  distinct  from  the  mercantile,  traffick- 
ing in  ideas:  — this  is  the  problem.  For  to  be  true  to  her, 
one  cannot  attempt  at  propitiation.  She  said  worse  things 
of  the  world  than  that  which  was  conveyed  to  the  boxed 
ears  of  Mrs.  Fryar-Gunnett.  Accepting  the  war  declared 
against  her  a  second  time,  she  performed  the  common  men- 
tal trick  in  adversity  of  setting  her  personally  known  in- 
nocence to  lessen  her  generally  unknown  error :  but  antici- 
pating that  this  might  become  known,  and  the  other  not; 
and  feeling  that  the  motives  of  the  acknowledged  error  had 
served  to  guard  her  from  being  the  culprit  of  the  charge 
she  writhed  under,  she  rushed  out  of  a  meditation  com- 
pounded of  mind  and  nerves,  with  derision  of  the  world's 
notion  of  innocence  and  estimate  of  error.  It  was  a  mood 
lasting  through  her  stay  in  London,  and  longer,  to  the  dis- 
comfort of  one  among  her  friends;  and  it  was  worthy  of 
The  Anti-climax  Expedition,  as  she  called  it. 

For  the  rest,  her  demeanour  to  the  old  monster  world 
exacting  the  servility  of  her,  in  repayment  for  its  tolerating 
countenance,  was  faultless.  Emma  beheld  the  introduction 
to  Mrs.  Warwick  of  his  bride,  by  Mr.  Percy  Dacier.     She 


372  DIAJ^TA   OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

had  watched  their  approach  up  the  Ball-room,  thinking, 
how  differently  would  Redworth  and  Tony  have  looked. 
Differently,  had  it  been  Tony  and  Dacier:  but  Emma  could 
not  persuade  herself  of  a  possible  harmony  between  them, 
save  at  the  cost  of  Tony's  expiation  of  the  sin  of  the 
greater  heart  in  a  performance  equivalent  to  Suttee.  Per- 
fectly an  English  gentleman  of  the  higher  order,  he  seemed 
the  effigy  of  a  tombstone  one,  fixed  upright,  and  civilly 
proud  of  his  effigy  bride.  So  far,  Emma  considered  them 
fitted.  She  perceived  his  quick  eye  on  her  corner  of  the 
room ;  necessarily,  for  a  man  of  his  breeding,  without  a 
change  of  expression.  An  emblem  pertaining  to  her  creed 
was  on  the  heroine's  neck ;  also  dependant  at  her  waist. 
She  was  white  from  head  to  foot ;  a  symbol  of  purity.  Her 
frail  smile  appeared  deeply  studied  in  purity.  Judging 
from  her  look  and  her  reputation,  Emma  divined  that  the 
man  was  justly  mated  with  a  devious  filmy  sentimentalist, 
likely  to  ^^  fiddle  hai'monics  on  the  sensual  strings  "  for  him 
at  a  mad  rate  in  the  years  to  come.  Such  fiddling  is  indeed 
the  peculiar  diversion  of  the  opulent  of  a  fatly  prosperous 
people ;  who  take  it,  one  may  concede  to  them,  for  an  in- 
spired elimination  of  the  higher  notes  of  life  :  the  very 
highest.  That  saying  of  Tony's  ripened  with  full  signifi- 
cance to  Emma  now.  Not  sensualism,  but  sham  spiritual- 
ism, was  the  meaning;  and  however  fine  the  notes,  they 
come  skilfully  evoked  of  the  under-brute  in  us.  Reasoning 
it  so,  she  thought  it  a  saying  for  the  penetration  of  the 
most  polished  and  deceptive  of  the  later  human  masks. 
She  had  besides,  be  it  owned,  a  triumph  in  conjuring  a  sen- 
tence of  her  friend's,  like  a  sword's  edge,  to  meet  them ; 
for  she  was  boiling  angrily  at  the  ironical  destiny  which 
had  given  to  those  Two  a  beclouding  of  her  beloved,  whom 
she  could  have  rebuked  in  turn  for  her  insane  caprice  of 
passion. 

But  when  her  beloved  stood-up  to  greet  Mrs.  Percy  Dacier, 
all  idea  save  tremulous  admiration  of  the  valiant  woman, 
who  had  been  wounded  nigh  to  death,  passed  from  Emma's 
mind.  Diana  tempered  her  queenliness  to  address  the  fa- 
voured lady  with  smiles  and  phrases  of  gentle  warmth,  of 
goodness  of  nature;  and  it  became  a  halo  rather  than  a 
personal  eclipse  that  she  cast. 


A   SHORT  EXCUKSION   IN  ANTI-CLIMAX  373 

Emma  looked  at  Dacier.  He  wore  the  prescribed  con- 
ventional air,  subject  in  half  a  minute  to  a  rapid  blinking 
of  the  eyelids.  His  wife  could  have  been  inimically  ima- 
gined fascinated  and  dwindling.  A  spot  of  colour  came  to 
her  cheeks.     She  likewise  began  to  blink. 

The  happy  couple  bowed,  proceeding ;  and  Emma  had 
Dacier's  back  for  a  study.  We  score  on  that  flat  slate  of 
man,  unattractive  as  it  is  to  hostile  observations,  and  un- 
protected, the  device  we  choose.  Her  harshest,  was  the 
positive  thought  that  he  had  taken  the  woman  best  suited 
to  him.  Doubtless,  he  was  a  man  to  prize  the  altar-candle 
above  the  lamp  of  day.  She  fancied  the  back-view  of  him 
shrunken  and  straitened  :  perhaps  a  mere  hostile  fancy : 
though  it  was  conceivable  that  he  should  desire  as  little  of 
these  meetings  as  possible.     Eclipses  are  not  courted. 

The  specially  womanly  exultation  of  Emma  Dunstane  in 
her  friend's  noble  attitude,  seeing  how  their  sex  had  been 
struck  to  the  dust  for  a  trifling  error,  easily  to  be  over- 
looked by  a  manful  lover,  and  had  asserted  its  dignity  in 
physical  and  moral  splendour,  in  self-mastery  and  benign- 
ness,  was  unshared  by  Diana.  As  soon  as  the  business  of 
the  expedition  was  over,  her  orders  were  issued  for  the 
sale  of  the  lease  of  her  house  and  all  it  contained.  "  I 
would  sell  Danvers  too,"  she  said,  "but  the  creature  de- 
clines to  be  treated  as  merchandize.  It  seems  I  have  a 
faithful  servant;  very  much  like  my  life,  not  quite  to  my 
taste  ;  the  one  thing  out  of  the  wreck  !  —  with  my  dog  !  " 

Before  quitting  her  house  for  the  return  to  Copsley,  she 
had  to  grant  Mr.  Alexander  Hepburn,  post-haste  from  his 
Caledonia,  a  private  interview.  She  came  out  of  it  notice- 
ably shattered.  Nothing  was  related  to  Emma,  beyond  the 
remark :  "  I  never  knew  till  this  morning  the  force  of  No 
in  earnest."  The  weighty  little  word — woman's  native 
watchdog  and  guardian,  if  she  calls  it  to  her  aid  in  earnest 
—  had  encountered  and  withstood  a  fiery  ancient  host, 
astonished  at  its  novel  power  of  resistance. 

Emma  contented  herself  with  the  result.  ^'  Were  you 
much  supplicated  ?  " 

"  An  Operatic  Fourth-Act,"  said  Diana,  by  no  means  feel- 
ing so  flippantly  as  she  spoke. 

She  received,  while  under  the  impression  of  this  man's 


374  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

honest,  if  primitive,  ardour  of  courtship,  or  effort  to  cap- 
ture, a  characteristic  letter  from  Westlake,  choicely  phrased, 
containing  presumeably  an  application  for  her  hand,  in  the 
generous  offer  of  his  own.  Her  reply  to  a  pursuer  of  that 
sort  was  easy.  Comedy,  after  the  barbaric  attack,  re- 
freshed her  wits  and  reliance  on  her  natural  fencing 
weapons.  To  Westlake,  the  unwritten  No  was  conveyed 
in  a  series  of  kindly  ironic  subterfuges,  that  played  it  like 
an  impish  flea  across  the  pages,  just  giving  the  bloom  of 
the  word ;  and  rich  smiles  come  to  Emma's  life  in  read- 
ing the  dexterous  composition :  which,  however,  proved  so 
thoroughly  to  Westlake's  taste,  that  a  second  and  a  third 
exercise  in  the  comedy  of  the  negative  had  to  be  despatched 
to  him  from  Copsley. 


CHAPTEE  XL 


IN   WHICH   WE    SEE   NATURE   MAKING   OF   A    WOMAN   A 
MAID    AGAIN,    AND    A    THRICE    WHIMSICAL 

On  their  way  from  London,  after  leaving  the  station,  the 
drive  through  the  valley  led  them  past  a  field,  where 
cricketers  were  at  work  bowling  and  batting  under  a  verti- 
cal sun :  not  a  very  comprehensible  sight  to  ladies,  whose 
practical  tendencies,  as  observers  of  the  other  sex,  incline 
them  to  question  the  gain  of  such  an  expenditure  of  energy. 
The  dispersal  of  the  alphabet  over  a  printed  page  is  not  less 
perplexing  to  the  illiterate.  As  soon  as  Emma  Dunstane 
discovered  the  Copsley  head  gamekeeper  at  one  wicket, 
and,  actually,  Thomas  Kedworth  facing  him,  bat  in  hand, 
she  sat  up,  greatly  interested.  Sir  Lukin  stopped  the  car- 
riage at  the  gate,  and  reminded  his  wife  that  it  was  the 
day  of  the  year  for  the  men  of  his  estate  to  encounter  a 
valley  Eleven.  Redworth,  like  the  good  fellow  he  was,  had 
come  down  by  appointment  in  the  morning  out  of  London, 
to  fill  the  number  required,  Copsley  being  weak  this  year. 
Eight  of  their  wickets  had  fallen  for  a  lamentable  figure  of 
twenty-nine  runs  j  himself  clean-bowled  the  first  ball.     But 


A  WOMAN  A  MAID  AGAIN  375 

Tom  Redworth  had  got  fast  hold  of  his  wicket,  and  already 
scored  fifty  to  his  bat.  ''  There !  grand  hit !  ^'  Sir  Lukin 
cried,  the  ball  flying  hard  at  the  rails.  "  Once  a  cricketer, 
always  a  cricketer,  if  you  've  legs  to  fetch  the  runs.  And 
Pullen's  not  doing  badly.  His  business  is  to  stick.  We 
shall  mark  them  a  hundred  yet.  I  do  hate  a  score  on  our 
side  without  the  two  OO's."  He  accounted  for  Redworth's 
mixed  colours  by  telling  the  ladies  he  had  lent  him  his 
flannel  jacket;  which,  against  black  trousers,  looked  odd 
but  not  ill. 

Gradually  the  enthusiasm  of  the  booth  and  bystanders 
converted  the  flying  of  a  leather  ball  into  a  subject  of 
honourable  excitement. 

"And  why  are  you  doing  nothing?"  Sir  Lukin  was 
asked  ;  and  he  explained  : 

"  My  stumps  are  down :  I  'm  married."  He  took  his 
wife's  hand  prettily. 

Diana  had  a  malicious  prompting.  She  smothered  the 
wasp,  and  said  :  "  Oh  !  look  at  that ! " 

"  Grand  hit  again !  Oh  !  good  !  good  !  "  cried  Sir  Lukin, 
clapping  to  it,  while  the  long-hit-oS  ran  spinning  his  legs 
into  one  for  an  impossible  catch ;  and  the  batsmen  were 
running  and  stretching  bats,  and  the  ball  flying  away,  fly- 
ing back,  and  others  after  it,  and  still  the  batsmen  running, 
till  it  seemed  that  the  ball  had  escaped  control  and  was 
leading  the  fielders  on  a  coltish  innings  of  its  own,  defiant 
of  bowlers. 

Diana  said  merrily  :  "  Bravo  our  side !  " 

"  Bravo,  old  Tom  Redworth ! "  rejoined  Sir  Lukin. 
"  Four,  and  a  three !  And  capital  weather,  have  n't  we ! 
Hope  we  shall  have  same  sort  day  next  month  —  return 
match,  my  ground.  I've  seen  Tom  Redworth  score  —  old 
days  —  over  two  hundred  t'  his  bat.  And  he  used  to  bowl 
too.  But  bowling  wants  practice.  And,  Emmy,  look  at 
the  old  fellows  lining  the  booth,  pipe  in  mouth  and  cheer- 
ing. They  do  enjoy  a  day  like  this.  We  '11  have  a  supper 
for  fifty  at  Copsley's  :  —  it 's  fun.  By  Jove  !  we  must  have 
reached  up  to  near  the  hundred." 

He  commissioned  a  neighbouring  boy  to  hie  to  the  booth 
for  the  latest  figures,  and  his  emissary  taught  lightning  a 
lesson. 


876  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Diana  praised  the  little  fellow. 

"  Yes,  he  's  a  real  English  boy,"  said  Emma. 

"We've  thousands  of  'em,  thousands,  ready  to  your 
hand  ! ''  exclaimed  Sir  Lukin ;  "  and  a  confounded  Radi- 
calized country  ..."  he  muttered  gloomily  of  "lets  us 
be  kicked !  .  .  .  any  amount  of  insult,  meek  as  gruel !  .  .  . 
making  of  the  finest  army  the  world,  has  ever  seen  !  You 
saw  the  papers  this  morning  ?  Good  heaven  !  how  a  nation 
with  an  atom  of  self-respect  can  go  on  standing  that  sort  of 
bullying  from  foreigners  !  We  do.  We  're  insulted  and 
we  're  threatened,  and  we  call  for  a  hymn !  —  Now  then, 
my  man,  what  is  it  ?  " 

The  boy  had  flown  back.  "  Ninety-two  marked,  sir ; 
ninety-nine  runs;  one  more  for  the  hundred." 

"  Well  reckoned  ;  and  mind  you  're  up  at  Copsley  for  the 
return-match.  —  And  Tom  Redworth  says,  they  may  bite 
their  thumbs  to  the  bone  —  they  don't  hurt  us.  I  tell  him, 
he  has  no  sense  of  national  pride.  He  says,  we  're  not 
prepared  for  war.  We  never  are  !  And  whose  the  fault  ? 
Says,  we  're  a  peaceful  people,  but  'ware  who  touches  us ! 
He  does  n't  feel  a  kick.  —  Oh  !  clever  snick  !  Hurrah  for 
the  hundred!  —  Two  —  three.  No,  don't  force  the  running, 
you  fools  !  —  though  they  're  wild  with  the  ball :  ha !  —  no ! 
—  all  right ! "     The  wicket  stood.     Hurrah  ! 

The  heat  of  the  noonday  sun  compelled  the  ladies  to 
drive  on. 

"  Enthusiasm  has  the  privilege  of  not  knowing  monot- 
ony," said  Emma.     "  He  looks  well  in  flannels." 

"  Yes,  he  does,"  Diana  replied,  aware  of  the  reddening 
despite  her  having  spoken  so  simply.  "  I  think  the  chief 
advantage  men  have  over  us  is  in  their  amusements." 

"Their  recreations." 

"  That  is  the  better  word."  Diana  fanned  her  cheeks  and 
said  she  was  warm.  "  I  mean,  the  permanent  advantage. 
For  you  see  that  age  does  not  affect  them." 

"Tom  Redworth  is  not  a  patriarch,  my  dear." 

"  Well,  he  is  what  would  be  called  mature." 

"  He  can't  be  more  than  thirty-two  or  three ;  and  that, 
for  a  man  of  his  constitution,  means  youth." 

"  Well,  I  can  imagine  him  a  patriarch  playing  cricket." 

"I  should  imagine  you  imagine  the  possible  chances. 
He  is  the  father  who  would  play  with  his  boys." 


A   WOMAN  A  MAID   AGAIN  377 

"And  lock  up  his  girls  in  the  nursery.'*  Diana  mur- 
mured of  the  extraordinary  heat. 

Emma  begged  her  to  remember  his  heterodox  views  of 
the  education  for  girls. 

"  He  bats  admirably,"  said  Diana.  "  I  wish  I  could  bat 
half  as  well." 

"  Your  batting  is  with  the  tongue." 

"  Not  so  good.  And  a  solid  bat,  or  bludgeon,  to  defend 
the  poor  stumps,  is  surer.  But  there  is  the  difference  of 
cricket:  —  when  your  stumps  are  down,  you  are  idle,  at 
leisure  ;  not  a  miserable  prisoner." 

"  Supposing  all  marriages  miserable." 

"  To  the  mind  of  me,"  said  Diana,  and  observed  Emma's 
rather  saddened  eyelids  for  a  proof  that  schemes  to  rob  her 
of  dear  liberty  were  certainly  planned. 

They  conversed  of  expeditions  to  Redworth's  Berkshire 
mansion,  and  to  The  Crossways,  untenanted  at  the  moment, 
as  he  had  informed  Emma,  who  fancied  it  would  please 
Tony  to  pass  a  night  in  the  house  she  loved ;  but  as  he  was 
to  be  of  the  party  she  coldly  acquiesced. 

The  woman  of  flesh  refuses  pliancy  when  we  want  it  of 
her,  and  will  not,  until  it  is  her  good  pleasure,  be  bent  to 
the  development  called  a  climax,  as  the  puppet-woman, 
mother  of  Fiction  and  darling  of  the  multitude  !  ever 
amiably  does,  at  a  hint  of  the  Nuptial  Chapter.  Diana  in 
addition  sustained  the  weight  of  brains.  Neither  with 
waxen  optics  nor  with  subservient  jointings  did  she  go 
through  her  pathways  of  the  world.  Her  direct  individu- 
ality rejected  the  performance  of  simpleton,  and  her  lively 
blood,  the  warmer  for  its  containment,  quickened  her  to 
penetrate  things  and  natures ;  and  if  as  yet,  in  justness  to 
the  loyal  male  friend,  she  forbore  to  name  him  conspirator, 
she  read  both  him  and  Emma,  whose  inner  bosom  was 
revealed  to  her,  without  an  effort  to  see.  But  her  char- 
acteristic chasteness  of  mind,  —  not  coldness  of  the  blood, 
—  which  had  supported  an  arduous  conflict,  past  all  exist- 
ing rights  closely  to  depict,  and  which  barbed  her  to  pierce 
to  the  wishes  threatening  her  freedom,  deceived  her  now  to 
think  her  flaming  in  blushes  came  of  her  relentless  divina- 
tion on  behalf  of  her  recovered  treasure  :  whereby  the  clear 
reading  of  others  distracted  the  view  of  herself.     For  one 


378  DIANA   OF  THE   CEOSSWATS 

may  be  the  cleverest  alive,  and  still  hoodwinked  while 
blood  is  young  and  warm. 

The  perpetuity  of  the  contrast  presented  to  her  reflec- 
tions, of  Eedworth's  healthy,  open,  practical,  cheering  life, 
and  her  own  freakishly  interwinding,  darkly  penetrative, 
simulacrum  of  a  life,  cheerless  as  well  as  useless,  forced 
her  humiliated  consciousness  by  degrees,  in  spite  of  pride, 
to  the  knowledge  that  she  was  engaged  in  a  struggle  with 
him ;  and  that  he  was  the  stronger  ;  —  it  might  be,  the 
worthier :  she  thought  him  the  handsomer.  He  throve  to 
the  light  of  day,  and  she  spun  a  silly  web  that  meshed  her 
in  her  intricacies.  Her  intuition  of  Emma's  wishes  led 
to  this ;  he  was  constantly  before  her.  She  tried  to  laugh 
at  the  image  of  the  concrete  cricketer,  half-flannelled,  and 
red  of  face  :  the  "  lucky  calculator,"  as  she  named  him  to 
Emma,  who  shook  her  head,  and  sighed.  The  abstract, 
healthful  and  powerful  man,  able  to  play  besides  profitably 
working,  defied  those  poor  efforts.  Consequently,  at  once 
she  sent  up  a  bubble  to  the  skies,  where  it  became  a  spheral 
realm,  of  far  too  fine  an  atmosphere  for  men  to  breathe  in 
it ;  and  thither  she  transported  herself  at  will,  whenever 
the  contrast,  with  its  accompanying  menace  of  a  tyrannic 
subjugation,  overshadowed  her.  In  the  above,  the  king- 
dom composed  of  her  shattered  romance  of  life  and  her 
present  aspirings,  she  was  free  and  safe.  Nothing  touched 
her  there  —  nothing  that  Redworth  did.  She  could  not 
have  admitted  there  her  ideal  of  a  hero.  It  was  the  sub- 
limation of  a  virgin's  conception  of  life,  better  fortified 
against  the  enemy.  She  peopled  it  with  souls  of  the  great 
and  pure,  gave  it  illimitable  horizons,  dreamy  nooks,  ravish- 
ing landscapes,  melodies  of  the  poets  of  music.  Higher 
and  more  celestial  than  the  Salvatore,  it  was  likewise,  now 
she  could  assure  herself  serenely,  independent  of  the  horrid 
blood-emotions.     Living  up  there,  she  had  not  a  feeling. 

The  natural  result  of  this  habit  of  ascending  to  a  super- 
lunary home,  was  the  loss  of  an  exact  sense  of  how  she 
was  behaving  below.  At  the  Berkshire  mansion,  she  wore 
a  supercilious  air,  almost  as  icy  as  she  accused  the  place  of 
being.  Emma  knew  she  must  have  seen  in  the  library  a 
row  of  her  literary  ventures,  exquisitely  bound ;  but  there 
was  no  allusion  to  the  books.     Mary  Paynham's  portrait  of 


A   WOMAN  A  MAID  AGAIN  379 

Mrs.  Warwick  hung  staring  over  the  fireplace,  and  was 
criticized,  as  though  its  occupancy  of  that  position  had  no 
significance. 

"  He  thinks  she  has  a  streak  of  genius,"  Diana  said  to 
Emma. 

"  It  may  be  shown  in  time,"  Emma  replied,  for  a  com- 
ment on  the  work.  '^He  should  know,  for  the  Spanish 
pictures  are  noble  acquisitions." 

"  They  are,  doubtless,  good  investments." 

He  had  been  foolish  enough  to  say,  in  Diana's  hearing, 
that  he  considered  the  purchase  of  the  Berkshire  estate  a 
good  investment.  It  had  not  yet  a  name.  She  suggested 
various  titles  for  Emma  to  propose  :  "  The  Funds  ;  "  or 
"  Capital  Towers  ;  "  or  "  Dividend  Manor ;  "  or  "  Railholm  ;  " 
blind  to  the  evidence  of  inflicting  pain.  Emma,  from  what 
she  had  guessed  concerning  the  purchaser  of  The  Crossways, 
apprehended  a  discovery  there  which  might  make  Tony's 
treatment  of  him  unkinder,  seeing  that  she  appeared  ac- 
tuated contrariously  ;  and  only  her  invalid's  new  happiness 
in  the  small  excursions  she  was  capable  of  taking  to  a  defi- 
nite spot,  of  some  homely  attractiveness,  moved  her  to  follow 
her  own  proposal  for  the  journey.  Diana  pleaded  urgently, 
childishly  in  tone,  to  have  Arthur  Rhodes  with  them,  "  so 
as  to  be  sure  of  a  sympathetic  companion  for  a  walk  on  the 
Downs."  At  The  Crossways,  they  were  soon  aware  that 
Mr.  Redworth's  domestics  were  in  attendance  to  serve  them. 
Manifestly  the  house  was  his  property,  and  not  much  of  an 
investment !  The  principal  bed-room,  her  father's  once,  and 
her  own,  devoted  now  to  Emma's  use,  appalled  her  with  a 
resemblance  to  her  London  room.  She  had  noticed  some  of 
her  furniture  at  "  Dividend  Manor,"  and  chosen  to  consider 
it  in  the  light  of  a  bargain  from  a  purchase  at  the  sale  of 
her  goods.  Here  was  her  bed,  her  writing-table,  her  chair 
of  authorship,  desks,  books,  ornaments,  water-colour  sketches. 
And  the  drawing-room  was  fitted  with  her  brackets  and  eta- 
geres,  holding  every  knick-knack  she  had  possessed  and  scat- 
tered, small  bronzes,  antiques,  ivory  junks,  quaint  ivory 
figures  Chinese  and  Japanese,  bits  of  porcelain,  silver  in- 
cense-urns, dozens  of  dainty  sundries.  She  had  a  shamed 
curiosity  to  spy  for  an  omission  of  one  of  them  ;  all  were 
there.     The  Crossways  had  been  turned  into  a  trap. 


880  DIANA   OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

Her  reply  to  this  blunt  wooing,  conspired,  she  felt  justi* 
fied  in  thinking,  between  him  and  Emma,  was  emphatic  in 
muteness.  She  treated  it  as  if  unobserved.  At  night,  in 
bed,  the  scene  of  his  mission  from  Emma  to  her  under  this 
roof,  barred  her  customary  ascent  to  her  planetary  kingdom. 
Next  day  she  took  Arthur  after  breakfast  for  a  walk  on  the 
Downs  and  remained  absent  till  ten  minutes  before  the  hour 
of  dinner.  As  to  that  young  gentleman,  he  was  near  to 
being  caressed  in  public.  Arthur's  opinions,  his  good  say- 
ings, were  quoted;  his  excellent  companionship  on  really 
poetical  walks,  and  perfect  sympathy,  praised  to  his  face. 
Challenged  by  her  initiative  to  a  kind  of  language  that 
threw  E-edworth  out,  he  declaimed:  "  We  pace  with  some 
who  make  young  morning  stale." 

"  Oh !  stale  as  peel  of  fruit  long  since  consumed,"  she 
chimed. 

And  so  they  proceeded  ;  and  they  laughed,  Emma  smiled 
a  little,  Redworth  did  the  same  beneath  one  of  his  question- 
ing frowns  —  a  sort  of  fatherly  grimace. 

A  suspicion  that  this  man,  when  infatuated,  was  able  to 
practise  the  absurdest  benevolence,  the  burlesque  of  chivalry, 
as  a  waTz-admiring  sex  esteems  it,  stirred  very  naughty 
depths  of  the  woman  in  Dania,  labouring  under  her  perverted 
mood.  She  put  him  to  proof,  for  the  chance  of  arming  her 
wickedest  to  despise  him.  Arthur  was  petted,  consulted, 
cited,  flattered  all  round;  all  but  caressed.  She  played, 
with  a  reserve,  the  maturish  young  woman  smitten  by  an 
adorable  youth  ;  and  enjoyed  doing  it  because  she  hoped  for 
a  visible  effect — more  paternal  benevolence  —  and  could 
do  it  so  dispassionately.  Coquetr}",  Emma  thought,  was 
most  unworthily  shown ;  and  it  was  of  the  worst  descrip- 
tion. Innocent  of  conspiracy,  she  had  seen  the  array  of 
Tony's  lost  household  treasures :  she  wondered  at  a  heart- 
lessness  that  would  not  even  utter  common  thanks  to  the 
friendly  man  for  the  compliment  of  prizing  her  portrait  and 
the  things  she  had  owned ;  and  there  seemed  an  effort  to 
wound  him. 

The  invalided  woman,  charitable  with  allowances  for  her 
erratic  husband,  could  offer  none  for  the  woman  of  a  long 
widowhood,  that  had  become  a  trebly  sensitive  maidenhood ; 
abashed  by  her  knowledge  of  the  world,  animated  by  her 


A   WOMAN   A  MAID  AGAIN  381 

abounding  blood  ;  cherishing  her  new  freedom,  dreading  the 
menacer;  feeling,  that  though  she  held  the  citadel,  she  was 
daily  less  sure  of  its  foundations,  and  that  her  hope  of  some 
last  romance  in  life  was  going;  for  in  him  shone  not  a 
glimpse.  He  appeared  to  Diana  as  a  fatal  power,  attracting 
her  without  sympathy,  benevolently  overcoming  :  one  of 
those  good  men,  strong  men,  who  subdue  and  do  not  kindle, 
The  enthralment  revolted  a  nature  capable  of  accepting 
subjection  only  by  burning.  In  return  for  his  moral  excel- 
lence, she  gave  him  the  moral  sentiments  :  esteem,  gratitude^ 
abstract  admiration,  perfect  faith.  But  the  man  ?  She  could 
not  now  say  she  had  never  been  loved  ;  and  a  flood  of  ten- 
derness rose  in  her  bosom,  swelling  from  springs  that  she 
had  previously  reproved  with  a  desperate  severity :  the  un* 
happy,  unsatisfied  yearning  to  be  more  than  loved,  to  love. 
It  was  alive,  out  of  the  wreck  of  its  first  trial.  This,  tho 
secret  of  her  natural  frailty,  was  bitter  to  her  pride  :  chastely- 
minded  as  she  was,  it  whelmed  her.  And  then  her  comic 
imagination  pictured  Redworth  dramatically  making  love. 
And  to  a  widow  !  It  proved  him  to  be  senseless  of  romance. 
Poetic  men  take  aim  at  maidens.  His  devotedness  to  a 
widow  was  charged  against  him  by  the  widow's  shudder  at 
antecedents  distasteful  to  her  soul,  a  discoloration  of  her 
life.  She  wished  to  look  entirely  forward,  as  upon  a  world 
washed  clear  of  night,  not  to  be  cast  back  on  her  antecedents 
by  practical  wooings  or  words  of  love  ;  to  live  spiritually ; 
free  of  the  shower  at  her  eyelids  attendant  on  any  idea  of 
her  loving.  The  woman  who  talked  of  the  sentimentalist's 
"  fiddling  harmonics,"  herself  stressed  the  material  chords, 
in  her  attempt  to  escape  out  of  herself  and  away  from  her 
pursuer. 

Meanwhile  she  was  as  little  conscious  of  what  she  was 
doing  as  of  how  she  appeared.  Arthur  went  about  with 
the  moony  air  of  surcharged  sweetness,  and  a  speculation 
on  it,  alternately  tiptoe  and  prostrate.  More  of  her  intoxi- 
cating wine  was  administered  to  him,  in  utter  thoughtless- 
ness of  consequences  to  one  who  was  but  a  boy  and  a  friend, 
almost  of  her  own  rearing.  She  told  Emma,  when  leaving 
The  Crossways,  that  she  had  no  desire  to  look  on  the  place 
again  :  she  wondered  at  Mr.  Redworth's  liking  such  a  soli- 
tude.    In  truth,  the  look  back  on  it  let  her  perceive  that 


382  DIAKA  OF  THE   CROSSWAYS 

her  husband  haunted  it,  and  disfigured  the  man,  of  real 
generosity,  as  her  heart  confessed,  but  whom  she  accused 
of  a  lack  of  prescient  delicacy,  for  not  knowing  she  would 
and  must  be  haunted  there.  Blaming  him,  her  fountain  of 
colour  shot  up,  at  a  murmur  of  her  un justness  and  the  poor 
man's  hopes. 

A  week  later,  the  youth  she  publicly  named  "  her  Arthur  " 
came  down  to  Copsley  with  news  of  his  having  been  recom- 
mended by  Mr.  Redworth  for  the  post  of  secretary  to  an 
old  Whig  nobleman  famous  for  his  patronage  of  men  of 
letters.  And  besides,  he  expected  to  inherit,  he  said,  and 
gazed  in  a  way  to  sharpen  her  instincts.  The  wine  he  had 
drunk  of  late  from  her  flowing  vintage  was  in  his  eyes. 
They  were  on  their  usual  rambles  out  along  the  heights. 
^'  Accept,  by  all  means,  and  thank  Mr.  Redworth,"  said  she, 
speeding  her  tongue  to  intercept  him.  "  Literature  is  a 
good  stick  and  a  bad  horse.  Indeed,  I  ought  to  know. 
You  can  always  write  ;  I  hope  you  will." 

She  stepped  fast,  hearing:  "Mrs.  Warwick  —  Diana! 
May  I  take  your  hand  ?  " 

This  was  her  pretty  piece  of  work  !  "  Why  should  you  ? 
If  you  speak  my  Christian  name,  no :  you  forfeit  any  pre- 
text. And  pray,  don't  loiter.  We  are  going  at  the  pace  of 
the  firm  of  Potter  and  Dawdle,  and  you  know  they  never  got 
their  shutters  down  till  it  was  time  to  put  them  up  again." 

Nimble-footed  as  she  was,  she  pressed  ahead  too  fleetly 
for  amorous  eloquence  to  have  a  chance.  She  heard 
"  Diana !  "  twice,  through  the  rattling  of  her  discourse  and 
flapping  of  her  dress. 

"  Christian  names  are  coin  that  seem  to  have  an  indif- 
ferent valuation  of  the  property  they  claim,"  she  said  in 
the  Copsley  garden;  ''and  as  for  hands,  at  meeting  and 
parting,  here  is  the  friendliest  you  could  have.  Only  don't 
look  rueful.  My  dear  Arthur,  spare  me  that,  or  1  shall 
blame  myself  horribly." 

His  chance  had  gone,  and  he  composed  his  face.  No 
hope  in  speaking  had  nerved  him;  merely  the  passion  to 
speak.  Diana  understood  the  state,  and  pitied  the  natu- 
rally modest  young  fellow,  and  chafed  at  herself  as  a  sense- 
less incendiar}^,  who  did  mischief  right  and  left,  from 
seeking  to  shun  the  apparently  inevitable.     A  side-thought 


A  WOMAN  A  MAID  AGAIIT  383 

intruded,  that  he  would  have  done  his  wooing  poetically  — 
not  in  the  burly  storm,  or  bull-Saxon,  she  apprehended. 
Supposing  it  imperative  with  her  to  choose  ?  She  looked 
up,  and  the  bird  of  broader  wing  darkened  the  whole  sky, 
bidding  her  know  that  she  had  no  choice. 

Emma  was  requested  to  make  Mr.  Redworth  acquainted 
with  her  story,  all  of  it :  —  "  So  that  this  exalted  friend- 
ship of  his  may  be  shaken  to  a  common  level.  He  has  an  un- 
bearably high  estimate  of  me,  and  it  hurts  me.  Tell  him  all ; 
and  more  than  even  you  have  known :  —  but  for  his  coming 
to  me,  on  the  eve  of  your  passing  under  the  surgeon's  hands, 
I  should  have  gone  —  flung  the  world  my  glove !  A  matter 
of  minutes.  Ten  minutes  later  !  The  train  was  to  start 
for  France  at  eight,  and  I  was  awaited.  I  have  to  thank 
heaven  that  the  man  was  one  of  those  who  can  strike  icily. 
Tell  Mr.  Redworth  what  I  say.  You  two  converse  upon 
every  subject.  One  may  be  too  loftily  respected  —  in  my 
case.  By  and  by  —  for  he  is  a  tolerant  reader  of  life  and 
women,  I  think  —  we  shall  be  humdrum  friends  of  the 
lasting  order.'' 

Emma's  cheeks  were  as  red  as  Diana^s.  "  I  fancy  Tom 
Redworth  has  not  much  to  learn  concerning  any  person  he 
cares  for,"  she  said.  "  You  like  him  ?  I  have  lost  touch 
of  you,  my  dear,  and  ask." 

"  I  like  him  :  that  I  can  say.  He  is  everything  I  am  not. 
But  now  I  am  free,  the  sense  of  being  undeservedly  over- 
esteemed  imposes  fetters,  and  I  don't  like  them.  I  have 
been  called  a  Beauty.  Rightly  or  other,  I  have  had  a 
Beauty's  career;  and  a  curious  caged  beast's  life  I  have 
found  it.  Will  you  promise  me  to  speak  to  him  ?  And 
also,  thank  him  for  helping  Arthur  Rhodes  to  a  situation." 

At  this,  the  tears  fell  from  her.  And  so  enigmatical  had 
she  grown  to  Emma,  that  her  bosom  friend  took  them  for 
a  confessed  attachment  to  the  youth. 

Diana's  wretched  emotion  shamed  her  from  putting  any 
inquiries  whether  Redworth  had  been  told.  He  came  re- 
peatedly, and  showed  no  change  of  face,  always  continuing 
in  the  form  of  huge  hovering  griffin  ;  until  an  idea,  instead 
of  the  monster  bird,  struck  her.  Might  she  not,  after  all, 
be  cowering  under  imagination  ?  The  very  maidenly  idea 
'■^aken'^d   oer  womanliness  —  to  reproach  her  remainder  of 


384  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

pride,  not  to  see  more  accurately.  It  was  the  reason  why 
she  resolved,  against  Emma's  extreme  entreaties,  to  take 
lodgings  in  the  South  valley  below  the  heights,  where  she 
could  be  independent  of  fancies  and  perpetual  visitors,  but 
near  her  beloved  at  any  summons  of  urgency  :  which  Emma 
would  not  habitually  send  because  of  the  coming  of  a  particu- 
lar gentleman.  Dresses  were  left  at  Copsley  for  dining  and 
sleeping  there  upon  occasion,  and  poor  Danvers,  despairing 
over  the  riddle  of  her  mistress,  was  condemned  to  the 
melancholy  descent.  "  It 's  my  belief,"  she  confided  to 
Lady  Dunstane's  maid  Bartlett,  '^she'll  hate  men  all  her 
life  after  that  Mr.  Dacier." 

If  women  were  deceived,  and  the  riddle  deceived  herself, 
there  is  excuse  for  a  plain  man  like  Redworth  in  not  having 
the  slightest  clue  to  the  daily  shifting  feminine  maze  he 
beheld.  The  strange  thing  was,  that  during  her  maiden 
time  she  had  never  been  shifty  or  flighty,  invariably  limpid 
and  direct. 


CHAPTER  XLI 

CONTAINS   A   REVELATION   OF     THE    ORIGIN    OF     THE   TIGRESS 

IN    DIANA 

An  afternoon  of  high  summer  blazed  over  London 
through  the  City's  awning  of  smoke,  and  the  three  classes 
of  the  population,  relaxed  by  the  weariful  engagement  with 
what  to  them  was  a  fruitless  heat,  were  severally  bathing 
their  ideas  in  dreams  of  the  contrast  possible  to  embrace : 
breezy  seas  or  moors,  aerial  Alps,  cool  beer.  The  latter,  if 
confessedly  the  lower  comfort,  is  the  readier  at  command  ; 
and  Thomas  Redworth,  whose  perspiring  frame  was  direct- 
ing his  inward  vision  to  fl}^  for  solace  to  a  trim  new  yacht, 
built  on  his  lines,  beckoning  from  Southampton  Water,  had 
some  of  the  amusement  proper  to  things  plucked  off  the 
levels,  in  the  conversation  of  a  couple  of  journeymen  close 
ahead  of  him,  as  he  made  his  way  from  a  quiet  street  of 
brokers'  offices  to  a  City  Bank.  One  asked  the  other  if  ho 
had  ever  tried  any  of  that  cold  stuff  they  were  now  selling 


THE   ORIGIN  OF   THE  TIGRESS   IN  DIANA  885 

out  of  barrows,  with  cream.  His  companion  answered, 
that  he  had  not  got  much  opinion  of  stuff  of  the  sortj  and 
what  was  it  like  ? 

"  Well,   it 's   cheap,   it   ain't  bad ;  it 's  cooling.     But  it 
ain't  refreshing." 

"  Just  what  I  reckoned  all  that  newfangle  rubbish." 
Without  a  consultation,  the  conservatives  in  beverage 
filed  with  a  smart  turn  about,  worthy  of  veterans  at  parade 
on  the  drill-ground,  into  a  public-house ;  and  a  dialogue 
chiefly  remarkable  for  absence  of  point,  furnished  matter 
to  the  politician's  head  of  the  hearer.  Provided  that  their 
beer  was  unadulterated !  Beer  they  would  have  ;  and  why 
not,  in  weather  like  this  ?  But  how  to  make  the  publican 
honest !  And  he  was  not  the  only  trickster  preying  on  the 
multitudinous  poor  copper  crowd,  rightly  to  be  protected 
by  the  silver  and  the  golden.  Eevelations  of  the  arts  prac- 
tised to  plump  them  with  raw-earth  and  minerals  in  the 
guise  of  nourishment,  had  recently  knocked  at  the  door  of 
the  general  conscience  and  obtained  a  civil  reply  from  the 
footman.  Kepulsive  as  the  thought  was  to  one  still  hold- 
ing to  Whiggish  Liberalism,  though  flying  various  Radical 
kites,  he  was  caught  by  the  decisive  ultra-torrent,  and 
whirled  to  admit  the  necessity  for  the  interference  of  the 
State,  to  stop  the  poisoning  of  the  poor.  Upper  classes 
have  never  legislated  systematically  in  their  interests ;  and 
quid  .  .  .  rabidse  tradis  ovile  lupse  ?  says  one  of  the  multi- 
tude. We  may  be  seeing  fangs  of  wolves  where  fleeces 
waxed.  The  State  that  makes  it  a  vital  principle  to  con- 
cern itself  with  the  helpless  poor,  meets  instead  of  waiting 
for  Democracy  ;  which  is  a  perilous  flood  but  when  it  is 
dammed.  Or  else,  in  course  of  time,  luxurious  yachting, 
my  friend,  will  encounter  other  reefs  and  breakers  than 
briny  ocean's !  Capital,  whereat  Diana  Warwick  aimed 
her  superbest  sneer,  has  its  instant  duties.  She  theorized 
on  the  side  of  poverty,  and  might  do  so  :  he  had  no  right 
to  be  theorizing  on  the  side  of  riches.  Across  St.  George's 
Channel,  the  cry  for  humanity  in  Capital  was  an  agony. 
He  ought  to  be  there,  doing,  not  cogitating.  The  post  of 
Irish  Secretary  must  be  won  by  real  service  founded  on 
absolute  local  knowledge.  Yes,  and  sympathy,  if  you  likcj 
but  sympathy  is  for  proving,  not  prating.  .  .  , 

25 


386  DIANA   OF  THE   CKOSSWAYS 

These  were  the  meditations  of  a  man  in  love ;  veins, 
arteries,  headpiece  in  love,  and  constantly  brooding  at  a 
solitary  height  over  the  beautiful  coveted  object;  only  too 
bewildered  by  her  multifarious  evanescent  feminine  eva- 
sions, as  of  colours  on  a  ruffled  water,  to  think  of  pouncing : 
for  he  could  do  nothing  to  soften,  nothing  that  seemed  to 
please  her :  and  all  the  while,  the  motive  of  her  mind  im- 
pelled him  in  reflection  beyond  practicable  limits :  even 
pointing  him  to  apt  quotations  !  Either  he  thought  within 
her  thoughts,  or  his  own  were  at  her  disposal.  Nor  was  it 
sufficient  for  him  to  be  sensible  of  her  influence,  to  restrain 
the  impetus  he  took  from  her.  He  had  already  wedded 
her  morally,  and  much  that  he  did,  as  well  as  whatever  he 
debated,  came  of  Diana ;  more  than  if  they  had  been  coupled, 
when  his  downright  practical  good  sense  could  have  spoken. 
She  held  him  suspended,  swaying  him  in  that  posture  ;  and 
he  was  not  a  whit  ashamed  of  it.  The  beloved  woman  was 
throned  on  the  very  highest  of  the  man. 

Furthermore,  not  being  encouraged,  he  had  his  peculiar 
reason  for  delay,  though  now  he  could  offer  her  wealth.  She 
had  once  in  his  hearing  derided  the  unpleasant  hiss  of  the 
ungainly  English  matron's  title  of  Mrs.  There  was  no 
harm  in  the  accustomed  title,  to  his  taste ;  but  she  disliking 
it,  he  did  the  same,  on  her  special  behalf ;  and  the  prospect, 
funereally  draped,  of  a  title  sweeter-sounding  to  her  ears, 
was  above  his  horizon.  Bear  in  mind,  that  he  underwent 
the  reverse  of  encouragement.  Any  small  thing  to  please 
her  was  magnified,  and  the  anticipation  of  it  nerved  the 
modest  hopes  of  one  who  deemed  himself  and  any  man 
alive  deeply  her  inferior. 

Such  was  the  mood  of  the  lover  condemned  to  hear  an- 
other malignant  scandal  defiling  the  name  of  the  woman 
he  worshipped.  Sir  Lukin  Dunstane,  extremely  hurried, 
bumped  him  on  the  lower  step  of  the  busy  Bank,  and  said : 
"  Pardon  ! "  and  "  Ha !  Redworth  !  making  money  ?  " 

"  Why,  what  are  you  up  to  down  here  ?  "  he  was  asked, 
and  he  answered :  "  Down  to  the  Tower,  to  an  officer 
quartered  there.  Not  bad  quarters,  but  an  infernal  distance. 
Business.'' 

Having  cloaked  his  expedition  to  the  distance  with  the 
comprehensive  word,  he  repeated  it ;  by  which  he  feared  he 


THE   ORIGIN   OF   THE  TIGRESS   INDIANA  387 

had  rendered  it  too  significant,  and  he  said:  "No,  no; 
nothing  particular ;  "  and  that  caused  the  secret  he  contained 
to  swell  in  his  breast  rebelliously,  informing  the  candid 
creature  of  the  fact  of  his  hating  to  lie :  whereupon  thus  he 
poured  himself  out,  in  the  quieter  bustle  of  an  alley,  off  the 
main  thoroughfare.  "  You  're  a  friend  of  hers.  I  'm  sure 
you  care  for  her  reputation ;  you  're  an  old  friend  of  hers, 
and  she 's  my  wife's  dearest  friend :  and  I  'm  fond  of  her 
too  ;  and  I  ought  to  be,  and  ought  to  know,  and  do  know : 
—  pure  ?  Strike  off  my  fist  if  there 's  a  spot  on  her 
character  !  And  a  scoundrel  like  that  fellow  Wroxeter  !  — 
Damnedest  rage  I  ever  was  in !  —  Swears  .  .  .  down  at 
Lockton  .  .  .  when  she  was  a  girl.  Why,  Redworth,  I  can 
tell  you,  when  Diana  Warwick  was  a  girl !  —  " 

Redworth  stopped  him.  "  Did  he  say  it  in  your  presence  ?  '* 

Sir  Lukin  was  drawn-up  by  the  harsh  question.  "  Well, 
no  ;  not  exactly."  He  tried  to  hesitate,  but  he  was  in  the 
hot  vein  of  a  confidence  and  he  wanted  advi2e.  "  The  cur 
said  it  to  a  woman  —  hang  the  woman !  And  she  hates 
Diana  Warwick  :  I  can't  tell  why — a  regular  snake's  hate. 
By  Jove  !  how  women  can  hate  !  '*' 

"  Who  is  the  woman  ?  "  said  Redworth. 

Sir  Lukin  complained  of  the  mob  at  his  elbows.  '*  I  don't 
like  mentioning  names  here." 

A  convenient  open  door  of  offices  invited  him  to  drag  his 
receptacle,  and  possible  counsellor,  into  the  passage,  where 
immediately  he  bethought  him  of  a  postponement  of  the 
distinct  communication  ;  but  the  vein  was  too  hot.  "  I  say, 
Redworth,  I  wish  you  'd  dine  with  me.  Let 's  drive  up  to 
my  Club.  —  Very  well,  two  words.  And  I  warn  you,  I  shall 
call  him  out,  and  make  it  appear  it 's  about  another  woman, 
who  '11  like  nothing  so  much,  if  I  know  the  Jezebel.  Some 
women  are  hussies,  let  'em  be  handsome  as  houris.  And 
she  's  a  fire-ship ;  by  heaven,  she  is  !  Come,  you  're  a  friend 
of  my  wife's,  but  you  're  a  man  of  the  world  and  my  friend, 
and  you  know  how  fellows  are  tempted,  Tom  Redworth.  — 
Cur  though  he  is,  he  's  likely  to  step  out  and  receive  a  les- 
son. —  Well,  he 's  the  favoured  cavalier  for  the  present  .  .  . 
h'm  .  .  .  Fryar-Gunnett.  Swears  he  told  her,  circumstan- 
tially ;  and  it  was  down  at  Lockton,  when  Diana  Warwick 
was  a  girl.     Swears  she  '11  spit  her  venom  at  her,  so  that 


388  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

Diana  Warwick  sha'n't  hold  her  head  up  in  London  Society, 
what  with  that  cur  Wroxeter,  Old  Dannisburgh,  and  Dacier. 
And  it  does  count  a  list,  does  n't  it  ?  —  confound  the  hand- 
some hag  !  She  's  jealous  of  a  dark  rival.  I  Ve  been  down 
to  Colonel  Hartswood  at  the  Tower,  and  he  thinks  Wroxeter 
deserves  horsewhipping,  and  we  may  manage  it.  I  know 
you  're  dead  against  duelling ;  and  so  am  I,  on  my  honour. 
But  you  see  there  are  cases  where  a  lady  must  be  protected ; 
and  anything  new,  left  to  circulate  against  a  lady  who  has 
been  talked  of  twice  —  Oh,  by  Jove  !  it  must  be  stopped. 
If  she  has  a  male  friend  on  earth,  it  must  be  stopped  on  the 
spot." 

Kedworth  eyed  Sir  Lukin  curiously  through  his  wrath. 

"We'll  drive  up  to  your  Club,"  he  said. 

"  Hartswood  dines  with  me  this  evening,  to  confer,"  re- 
joined Sir  Lukin.     "  Will  you  meet  him  ?  " 

"  I  can't,"  said  Redworth,  ''  I  have  to  see  a  lady,  whose 
affairs  I  have  been  attending  to  in  the  City ;  and  I  'm 
engaged  for  the  evening.  You  perceive,  my  good  fellow," 
he  resumed,  as  they  rolled  along,  "  this  is  a  delicate  busi- 
ness. You  have  to  consider  your  wife.  Mrs.  Warwick's 
name  won't  come  up,  but  another  woman's  will." 

"  I  meet  Wroxeter  at  a  gambling-house  he  frequents,  and 
publicly  call  him  cheat  —  slap  his  face,  if  need  be." 

"Sure  to!"  repeated  Eedworth.  "No  stupid  pretext 
will  quash  the  woman 's  name.  Now,  such  a  thing  as  a  duel 
would  give  pain  enough." 

"  Of  course  ;  I  understand,"  Sir  Lukin  nodded  his  clear 
comprehension.  "  But  what  is  it  you  advise,  to  trounce  the 
scoundrel,  and  silence  him  ?  " 

"  Leave  it  to  me  for  a  day.  Let  me  have  your  word  that 
you  won't  take  a  step :  positively  —  neither  you  nor 
Colonel  Hartswood.  I  '11  see  you  by  appointment  at  your 
Club."  Redworth  looked  up  over  the  chimneys.  "We're 
going  to  have  a  storm  and  a  gale,  I  can  tell  you." 

"  Gale  and  storm  !  "  cried  Sir  Lukin ;  "  what  has  that 
got  to  do  with  it  ?  " 

"  Think  of  something  else  for  a  time." 

"  And  that  brute  of  a  woman  —  deuced  handsome  she  is  I 
—  if  you  care  for  fair  women,  Redworth :  —  she  's  a  Venus 
jumped  slap  out  of  the  waves,  and  the  Devil  for  sire  —  that 


THE  ORIGIN    OF  THE  TIGRESS  IN  DIANA  389 

you  learn  :  —  running  about,  sowing  her  lies.  She  's  a  yel- 
low witch.  Oh!  but  she  ^s  a  shameless  minx.  And  a 
black-leg  cur  like  Wroxeter !  Any  woman  intimate  with 
a  fellow  like  that,  stamps  herself.  I  loathe  her.  Sort  of 
woman  who  swears  in  the  morning  you  're  the  only  man  on 
earth  ;  and  next  day  —  that  evening  —  engaged  !  —  fee  to 
Polly  Hopkins  —  and  it's  a  gentleman,  a  nobleman,  my 
lord  !  —  been  going  on  behind  your  back  half  the  season  !  — 
and  she  is  n't  hissed  when  she  abuses  a  lady,  a  saint  in 
comparison  !  You  know  the  world,  old  fellow  :  —  Brighton, 
"Richmond,  visits  to  a  friend  as  deep  in  the  bog.  How 
Fryar-Gunnett  —  a  man,  after  all  —  can  stand  it!  And 
drives  of  an  afternoon  for  an  airing  —  by  heaven  !  You  're 
out  of  that  mess,  Kedworth :  not  much  taste  for  the  sex ; 
and  you  're  right,  you  're  lucky.  Upon  my  word,  the  cor- 
ruption of  society  in  the  present  day  is  awful ;  it 's  appall- 
ing. —  I  rattled  at  her :  and  oh !  dear  me,  perks  on  her  hind 
heels  and  defies  me  to  prove :  and  she  's  no  pretender,  but 
hopes  she  's  as  good  as  any  of  my  '  chaste  Dianas.'  My 
dear  old  friend,  it'  s  when  you  come  upon  women  of  that 
kind  you  have  a  sickener.  And  I  'm  bound  by  the  best 
there  is  in  a  man  —  honour,  gratitude,  all  the  list  —  to 
defend  Diana  Warwick." 

"  So,  you  see,  for  your  wife's  sake,  your  name  can't  be 
hung  on  a  woman  of  that  kind,'^  said  Eedworth.  '^  I  '11  call 
here  the  day  after  to-morrow  at  three  p.  m," 

Sir  Lukin  descended  and  vainly  pressed  Redworth  to 
run  up  into  his  Club  for  refreshment.  Said  he  roguishly : 
«  Who  's  the  lady  ?  " 

The  tone  threw  Redworth  on  his  frankness. 

"  The  lady  I  've  been  doing  business  for  in  the  City,  is 
Miss  Paynham." 

"I  saw  her  once  at  Copsley  ;  good-looking.     Cleverish  ?  '* 

"She  has  ability." 

Entering  his  Club,  Sir  Lukin  was  accosted  in  the  reading- 
room  by  a  cavalry  officer,  a  Colonel  Launay,  an  old  Harro- 
vian, who  stood  at  the  window  and  asked  him  whether  it  was 
not  Tom  Redworth  in  the  cab.  Another,  of  the  same  School, 
standing  squared  before  a  sheet  of  one  of  the  evening  news- 
papers, heard  the  name  and  joined  them,  saying:  '^Tom 
Redworth  is  going  to  be  married,  some  fellow  told  me." 


390  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  He  '11  make  a  deuced  good  husband  to  any  woman  —  if 
it 's  true,"  said  Sir  Lukin,  with  Miss  Paynham  ringing  in 
his  head.  "  He 's  a  cool-blooded  old  boy,  and  likes  women 
for  their  intellects." 

Colonel  Launay  hummed  in  meditative  emphasis.  He 
stared  at  vacancy  with  a  tranced  eye,  and  turning  a  similar 
gaze  on  Sir  Lukin,  as  if  through  him,  burst  out :  "  Oh,  by 
G-eorge,  I  say,  what  a  hugging  that  woman  '11  get !  " 

The  cocking  of  ears  and  queries  of  Sir  Lukin  put  him  to 
the  test  of  his  right  to  the  remark  ;  for  it  sounded  of  occult 
acquaintance  with  interesting  subterranean  facts ;  and 
there  was  a  communication,  in  brief  syllables  and  the  dot 
language,  crudely  masculine.  Immensely  surprised,  Sir 
Lukin  exclaimed :  "  Of  course  !  when  fellows  live  quietly 
and  are  careful  of  themselves.  Ah  !  you  may  think  you 
know  a  man  for  years,  and  you  don't :  you  don't  know  more 
than  an  inch  or  two  of  him.  Why,  of  course,  Tom  Ked- 
worth  'd  be  uxorious  —  the  very  man  I  And  tell  us  what 
has  become  of  the  Firefly  now?  One  never  sees  her. 
Did  n't  complain  ?  " 

"Very  much  the  contrary." 

Both  gentlemen  were  grave,  believing  their  knowledge 
in  the  subterranean  world  of  a  wealthy  city  to  give  them 
a  positive  cognizance  of  female  humanity ;  and  the  sub- 
stance of  Colonel  Launay 's  communication  had  its  impres- 
siveness  for  them. 

"Well,  it's  a  turn  right-about-face  for  me,"  said  Sir 
Lukin.  "  What  a  world  we  live  in !  I  fancy  I  've  hit  on 
the  woman  he  means  to  marry ;  —  had  an  idea  of  another 
woman  once  ;  but  he 's  one  of  your  friendly  fellows  with 
women.  That 's  how  it  was  I  took  him  for  a  fish.  Great 
mistake,  I  admit.  But  Tom  Redworth  's  a  man  of  morals 
after  all ;  and  when  those  men  do  break  loose  for  a  plunge 
—  ha  !  Have  you  ever  boxed  with  him  ?  Well,  he  keeps 
himself  in  training,  I  can  tell  you." 

Sir  Lukin's  round  of  visits  drew  him  at  night  to  Lady 
Singleby's,  where  he  sighted  the  identical  young  lady  of  his 
thoughts.  Miss  Paynham,  temporarily  a  guest  of  the  house; 
and  he  talked  to  her  of  Redworth,  and  had  the  satisfaction 
to  spy  a  blush,  a  rageing  blush  :  which  avowal  presented 
her  to  his   view   as  an  exceedingly  good-looking   girl  j  so 


THE  ORIGIN  OF  THE  TIGRESS   IN  DIANA  391 

that  he  began  mentally  to   praise  Eedworth  for  a  manly 
superiority  to  small  trifles  and  the  world  's  tattle. 

"You  saw  him  to-day,"  he  said. 

She  answered:  "Yes.  He  goes  down  to  Copsley  tO' 
morrow." 

"  I  think  not,"  said  Sir  Lukin. 

"  I  have  it  from  him."  She  closed  her  eyelids  in 
speaking. 

"  He  and  I  have  some  rather  serious  business  in  town." 

"Serious?" 

"  Don't  be  alarmed  :  not  concerning  him." 

"  Whom,  then  ?  You  have  told  me  so  much  —  I  have  a 
right  to  know." 

"  Not  an  atom  of  danger,  I  assure  you  ?  " 

"It  concerns  Mrs.  Warwick !"  said  she. 

Sir  Lukin  thought  the  guess  extraordinary.  He  pre- 
served an  impenetrable  air.  But  he  had  spoken  enough  to 
set  that  giddy  head  spinning. 

Nowhere  during  the  night  was  Mrs.  Fryar-Gunnett 
visible.  Earlier  than  usual,  she  was  riding  next  day  in  the 
Kow,  alone  for  perhaps  two  minutes,  and  Sir  Lukin  passed 
her,  formally  saluting.  He  could  not  help  the  look  behind 
him,  she  sat  so  bewitchingly  on  horseback!  He  looked,  and 
behold,  her  riding-whip  was  raised  erect  from  the  elbow. 
It  was  his  horse  that  wheeled ;  compulsorily  he  was  borne 
at  a  short  canter  to  her  side. 

"  Your  commands  ?  " 

The  handsome  Amabel  threw  him  a  sombre  glance  from 
the  corners  of  her  uplifted  eyelids  ;  and  snakish  he  felt  it ; 
but  her  colour  and  the  line  of  her  face  went  well  with 
sullenness ;  and,  her  arts  of  fascination  cast  aside,  she 
fascinated  him  more  in  seeming  homelier,  girlish.  If 
the  trial  of  her  beauty  of  a  woman  in  a  temper  can  bear  the 
strain,  she  has  attractive  lures  indeed ;  irresistible  to  the 
amorous  idler:  and  when,  in  addition,  being  the  guilty 
person,  she  plays  the  injured,  her  show  of  temper  on  the 
taking  face  pitches  him  into  perplexity  with  his  own 
emotions,  creating  a  desire  to  strike  and  be  stricken,  howl 
and  set  howling,  which  is  of  the  happier  augury  for  tender 
reconcilement  on  the  terms  of  the  gentleman  on  his  kneecap, 
been   doing  a  pretty   thing!"   she   said,  and 


392  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

briefly  she  named  lier  house  and  half  an  hour,  and  flew. 
Sir  Lukin  was  left  to  admire  the  figure  of  the  horsewoman. 
Really,  her  figure  had  an  air  of  vindicating  her  successfully, 
except  for  the  poison  she  spat  at  Diana  Warwick.  And 
what  pretty  thing  had  he  been  doing  ?  He  reviewed 
dozens  of  speculations  until  the  impossibility  of  seizing  one 
determined  him  to  go  to  Mrs.  Fryar-Gunnett  at  the  end  of 
the  half-hour  —  "  Just  to  see  what  these  women  have  to  say 
for  themselves." 

Some  big  advance  drops  of  Eedworth's  thunderstorm 
drawing  gloomily  overhead,  warned  him  to  be  quick  and 
get  his  horse  into  stables.  Dismounted,  the  sensational 
man  was  irresolute,  suspecting  a  female  trap.  But  curi- 
osity^ combined  with  the  instinctive  turning  of  his  nose  in 
the  direction  of  the  lady's  house,  led  him  thither,  to  an  accom- 
paniment of  celestial  growls,  which  impressed  him,  judging 
by  that  naughty-girl  face  of  hers  and  the  woman's  tongue 
she  had,  as  a  likely  prelude  to  the  scene  to  come  below. 


CHAPTER  XLII 


THE    PENULTIMATE  I    SHOWING   A    FINAL   STRUGGLE   FOR 
LIBERTY   AND    RUN    INTO    HARNESS 

The  prophet  of  the  storm  had  forgotten  his  prediction ; 
which,  however,  was  of  small  concern  to  him,  apart  from 
the  ducking  he  received  midway  between  the  valley  and  the 
heights  of  Copsley ;  whither  he  was  bound,  on  a  mission  so 
serious  that,  according  to  his  custom  in  such  instances,  he 
chose  to  take  counsel  of  his  active  legs  :  an  adviseable  course 
when  the  brain  wants  clearing  and  the  heart  fortifying. 
Diana's  face  was  clearly  before  him  through  the  deluge  ; 
now  in  single  features,  the  dimple  running  from  her  mouth, 
the  dark  bright  eyes  and  cut  of  eyelids,  and  nostrils  alive 
under  their  lightning ;  now  in  her  whole  radiant  smile,  or 
musefully  listening,  nursing  a  thought.  Or  she  was 
obscured,  and  he  felt  the  face.  The  individuality  of  it 
had  him  by  the  heart,  beyond  his  powers  of  visioning.     On 


THE  PENULTIMATE  393 

his  arrival,  he  stood  in  the  hall,  adrip  like  one  of  the  trees 
of  the  lawn,  laughing  at  Lady  Dunstane's  anxious  excla- 
mations. His  portmanteau  had  come  and  he  was  expected ; 
she  hurried  out  at  the  first  ringing  of  the  bell,  to  greet  and 
reproach  him  for  walking  in  such  weather. 

"Diana  has  left  me,"  she  said,  when  he  reappeared  in 
dry  clothing.  "  We  are  neighbours  ;  she  has  taken  cottage- 
lodgings  at  Selshall,  about  an  hour's  walk :  —  one  of  her 
wild  dreams  of  independence.     Are  you  disappointed  ?  " 

"  I  am,"  Eedworth  confessed. 

Emma  coloured.  ^'  She  requires  an  immense  deal  of 
humouring  at  present.  The  fit  will  wear  off;  only  we 
must  wait  for  it.  Any  menace  to  her  precious  liberty 
makes  her  prickly.  She  is  passing  the  day  with  the 
Pettigrews,  who  have  taken  a  place  near  her  village  for  a 
month.  She  promised  to  dine  and  sleep  here,  if  she 
returned  in  time.     What  is  your  news  ?  " 

"  Nothing ;  the  world  wags  on." 

"  You  have  nothing  special  to  tell  her  ?  " 

"Nothing;''  he  hummed;  "nothing,  I  fancy,  that  she 
does  not  know." 

"  You  said  you  were  disappointed." 

"  It 's  always  a  pleasure  to  see  her." 

"  Even  in  her  worst  moods,  I  find  it  so." 

"  Oh !  moods !  "  quoth  Redworth. 

"  My  friend,  they  are  to  be  reckoned,  with  women." 

"Certainly;  what  I  meant  was,  that  I  don't  count  them 
against  women." 

"  Good ;  but  my  meaning  was  ...  I  think  I  remember 
your  once  comparing  them  and  the  weather ;  and  you  spoke 
of  the  *  one  point  more  variable  in  women.'  You  may  fore- 
stall your  storms.  There  is  no  calculating  the  effect  of  a 
few  little  words  at  a  wrong  season." 

"  With  women !  I  suppose  not.  I  have  no  pretension 
to  a  knowledge  of  the  sex." 

Emma  imagined  she  had  spoken  plainly  enough,  if  he 
had  immediate  designs ;  and  she  was  not  sure  of  that,  and 
wished  rather  to  shun  his  confidences  while  Tony  was  in 
her  young  widowhood,  revelling  in  her  joy  of  liberty.  By 
and  by,  was  her  thought :  perhaps  next  year.  She  dreaded 
Tony's  refusal  of  the  yoke,  and  her  iron-hardness  to  the 


394  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

dearest  of  men  proposing  it :  and  moreover,  lier  further  to 
be  apprehended  holding  to  the  refusal,  for  the  sake  of  con- 
sistency, if  it  was  once  uttered.  For  her  own  sake,  she 
shrank  from  hearing  intentions,  that  distressing  the  good 
man,  she  would  have  to  discountenance.  His  candour  in 
confessing  disappointment,  and  his  open  face,  his  excellent 
sense  too,  gave  her  some  assurance  of  his  not  being  fool- 
ishly impetuous.  After  he  had  read  to  her  for  an  hour,  as 
his  habit  was  on  evenings  and  wet  days,  their  discussion  of 
this  and  that  in  the  book  lulled  any  doubts  she  had  of  his 
prudence,  enough  to  render  it  even  a  dubious  point  whether 
she  might  be  speculating  upon  a  wealthy  bachelor  in  the 
old-fashioned  ultra-feminine  manner;  the  which  she  so 
abhorred  that  she  rejected  the  idea.  Consequently,  Red- 
worth's  proposal  to  walk  down  to  the  valley  for  Diana,  and 
bring  her  back,  struck  her  as  natural  when  a  shaft  of  west- 
ern sunshine  from  a  whitened  edge  of  raincloud  struck  her 
windows.  She  let  him  go  without  an  intimated  monition 
or  a  thought  of  one ;  thinking  simply  that  her  Tony  would 
be  more  likely  to  come,  having  him  for  escort.  Those  are 
silly  women  who  are  always  imagining  designs  and  in- 
trigues and  future  palpitations  in  the  commonest  actions 
of  either  sex.  Emma  Dunstane  leaned  to  the  contrast  be- 
tween herself  and  them. 

Danvers  was  at  the  house  about  sunset,  reporting  her 
mistress  to  be  on  her  way,  with  Mr.  Kedworth.  The 
maid's  tale  of  the  dreadful  state  of  the  lanes,  accounted 
for  their  tardiness ;  and  besides  the  sunset  had  been 
magnificent.  Diana  knocked  at  Emma's  bedroom  door, 
to  say,  outside,  hurriedly  in  passing,  how  splendid  the 
sunset  had  been,  and  beg  for  an  extra  five  minutes.  Tak- 
ing full  fifteen,  she  swam  into  the  drawing-room,  lively 
with  kisses  on  Emma's  cheeks,  and  excuses,  referring  her 
misconduct  in  being  late  to  the  seductions  of  "  Sol "  in  his 
glory.  Kedworth  said  he  had  rarely  seen  so  wonderful 
a  sunset.  The  result  of  their  unanimity  stirred  Emma's 
bosom  to  match-making  regrets;  and  the  walk  of  the 
pair  together,  alone  under  the  propitious  flaming  heavens, 
appeared  to  her  now  as  an  opportunity  lost.  From  sisterly 
sympathy,  she  fancied  she  could  understand  Tony's  liberty- 
loving  reluctance :  she  had  no  comprehension  of  the  back- 


THE  PENULTIMATE  895 

wardness  of  the  man  beholding  the  dear  woman  handsomer 
than  in  her  maiden  or  her  married  time :  and  sprightlier  as 
well.  She  chatted  deliciously,  and  drew  K-edworth  to  talk 
his  best  on  his  choicer  subjects,  playing  over  them  like  a  fire- 
wisp,  determined  at  once  to  flounder  him  and  to  make  him 
shine.  Her  tender  esteem  for  the  man  was  transparent 
through  it  all;  and  Emma,  whose  evening  had  gone  hap- 
pily between  them,  said  to  her,  in  their  privacy,  before 
parting :  "  You  seemed  to  have  been  inspired  by  '  Sol,'  my 
dear.     You  do  like  him,  don't  you  ?  " 

Diana  vowed  she  adored  him ;  and  with  a  face  of  laugh- 
ter in  rosy  suffusion,  put  Sol  for  Eedworth,  lledworth  for 
Sol;  but,  watchful  of  Emma's  visage,  said  finally:  "If  you 
mean  the  mortal  man,  I  think  him  up  to  almost  all  your 
hyperboles  —  as  far  as  men  go;  and  he  departed  to  his 
night's  rest,  which  I  hope  will  be  good,  like  a  king.  Not 
to  admire  him,  would  argue  me  senseless,  heartless.  I 
do;  I  have  reason  to." 

"And  you  make  him  the  butt  of  your  ridicule,  Tony." 

"No;  I  said  '  like  a  king; '  and  he  is  one.  He  has,  to 
me,  morally  the  grandeur  of  your  Sol  sinking,  Caesar 
stabbed,  Cato  on  the  sword-point.  He  is  Roman,  Spartan, 
Imperial;  English,  if  you  like,  the  pick  of  the  land.  It 
is  an  honour  to  call  him  friend,  and  I  do  trust  he  will 
choose  the  pick  among  us,  to  make  her  a  happy  woman 
—  if  she  's  for  running  in  harness.  There,  I  can't  say 
more." 

Emma  had  to  be  satisfied  with  it,  for  the  present. 

They  were  astonished  at  breakfast  by  seeing  Sir  Lukin 
ride  past  the  windows.  He  entered  with  the  veritable 
appetite  of  a  cavalier  who  had  ridden  from  London  fast- 
ing; and  why  he  had  come  at  that  early  hour,  he  was  too 
hungry  to  explain.  The  ladies  retired  to  read  their  letters 
by  the  morning's  post;  whereupon  Sir  Lukin  called  to 
Redworth:  "I  met  that  woman  in  the  park  yesterday,  and 
had  to  stand  a  volley.  I  went  beating  about  London  for 
you  all  the  afternoon  and  evening.  She  swears  you  rated 
her  like  a  scullery  wench,  and  threatened  to  ruin  Wroxeter. 
Did  you  see  him?  She  says,  the  story's  true  in  one  par- 
ticular, that  he  did  snatch  a  kiss,  and  got  mauled.  Not  so 
much  to  pay  for  it !     But  what  a  ruffian  —  eh?  " 


396  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"I  saw  hiui/^  said  Redworth.  "He's  one  of  the  new 
set  of  noblemen  who  take  bribes  to  serve  as  baits  for 
transactions  in  the  City.  They  help  to  the  ruin  of  their 
order,  or  are  signs  of  its  decay.  We  won't  judge  it  by 
him.  He  favoured  me  with  his  '  word  of  honour '  that  the 
thing  you  heard  was  entirely  a  misstatement,  and  so  forth: 

—  apologized,  I  suppose.     He  mumbled  something." 
"  A  thorough  cur  !  " 

"  He  professed  his  readiness  to  fight,  if  either  of  us  was 
not  contented. " 

"He  spoke  to  the  wrong  man.  I  've  half  a  mind  to  ride 
back  and  have  him  out  for  that  rascal  *  osculation  '  —  and 
the  lady  unwilling  !  —  and  she  a  young  one,  a  girl,  under 
the  protection  of  the  house  !  By  Jove  !  Redworth,  when 
you  come  to  consider  the  scoundrels  men  can  be,  it  stirs  a 
fellow's  bile.     There  's  a  deal  of  that  sort  of  villany  going 

—  and  succeeding  sometimes !     He  deserves  the  whip  or  a 
bullet." 

"A  sermon  from  Lukin  Dunstane  might  punish  him." 

"Oh  !  I  'm  a  sinner,  I  know.  But,  go  and  tell  one  wo- 
man of  another  woman,  and  that  a  lie  !    That 's  beyond  me." 

"  The  gradations  of  the  deeps  are  perhaps  measureable 
to  those  who  are  in  them." 

"The  sermon's  at  me  —  pop!"  said  Sir  Lukin.  "By 
the  way,  I  'm  coming  round  to  think  Diana  Warwick  was 
right  when  she  used  to  jibe  at  me  for  throwing  up  my 
commission.  Idleness  is  the  devil  —  or  mother  of  him. 
I  manage  my  estates;  but  the  truth  is,  it  doesn't  occupy 
my  mind." 

"Your  time." 

"My  mind,  I  say." 

"Whichever  you  please." 

"You're  crusty  to-day,  Redworth.  Let  me  tell  you,  I 
think  —  and  hard  too,  when  the  fit 's  on  me.  However, 
you  did  right  in  stopping  —  I'll  own  —  a  piece  of  folly, 
and  shutting  the  mouths  of  those  two;  though  it  caused  me 
to  come  in  for  a  regular  drencher.  But  a  pretty  woman 
in  a  right-down  termagant  passion  is  good  theatre ;  because 
it  can't  last,  at  that  pace;  and  you  're  sure  of  your  agree- 
able tableau.  Not  that  I  trust  her  ten  minutes  out  of 
sight  —  or  any  woman,  except  one  or  two  ;  my  wife  and 


THE  PENULTIMATE  397 

Diana  Warwick.  Trust  those  you  've  tried,  old  boy. 
Diana  Warwick  ought  to  be  taught  to  thank  you  ;  though 
I  don't  know  how  it 's  to  be  done." 

"The  fact  of  it  is,"  Redworth  frowned  and  rose,  "I  *ve 
done  mischief.  I  had  no  right  to  mix  myself  in  it.  I  'm 
seldom  caught  off  my  feet  by  an  impulse;  but  I  was.  I 
took  the  fever  from  you." 

He  squared  his  figure  at  the  window,  and  looked  up  on 
a  driving  sky. 

"Come,  let 's  play  open  cards,  Tom  Redworth,"  said  Sir 
Lukin,  leaving  the  table  and  joining  his  friend  by  the 
window.  "You  moral  men  are  doomed  to  be  marrying 
men,  always;  and  quite  right.  Not  that  one  doesn't  hear 
a  roundabout  thing  or  two  about  you:  no  harm.  Very 
much  the  contrary:  —  as  the  world  goes.  But  you  're  the 
man  to  marry  a  wife;  and  if  I  guess  the  lady,  she  's  a  sen- 
sible girl  and  won't  be  jealous.  I  'd  swear  she  only  waits 
for  asking." 

"Then  you  don't  guess  the  lady,"  said  Redworth. 

"  Mary  Paynham  ?  " 

The  desperate  half -laugh  greeting  the  name  convinced 
more  than  a  dozen  denials. 

Sir  Lukin  kept  edging  round  for  a  full  view  of  the  friend 
who  shunned  inspection.  "  But  is  it  ?  .  .  .  can  it  be  ?  it 
must  be,  after  all !  .  .  .  why,  of  course  it  is  !  But  the 
thing  staring  us  in  the  face  is  just  what  we  never  see. 
Just  the  husband  for  her  !  —  and  she  's  the  wife  !  Why, 
Diana  Warwick  's  the  very  woman,  of  course  !  I  remember 
I  used  to  think  so  before  she  was  free  to  wed." 

"She  is  not  of  that  opinion."  Redworth  blew  a  heavy 
breath;  and  it  should  be  chronicled  as  a  sigh;  but  it  was 
hugely  masculine. 

"Because  you  didn't  attack,  the  moment  she  was  free; 
that's  what  upset  my  calculations,"  the  sagacious  gentle- 
man continued,  for  a  vindication  of  his  acuteness:  then 
seizing  the  reply:  "Refuses?  You  don't  mean  to  say 
you  're  the  man  to  take  a  refusal  ?  and  from  a  green  widow 
in  the  blush  ?  Did  you  see  her  cheeks  when  she  was  peep- 
ing at  the  letter  in  her  hand  ?  She  colours  at  half  a  word 
—  takes  the  lift  of  a  finger  for  Hymen  coming.  And  lots 
of  fellows  are  after  her;  I   know  it  from   Emmy.     But 


398  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

you  're  not  the  man  to  be  refused.  You  're  her  friend  — » 
her  champion.  That  woman  Fryar-Gunnett  would  have  it 
you  were  the  favoured  lover,  and  sneered  at  my  talk  of  old 
friendship.  Women  are  always  down  dead  on  the  facts; 
can't  put  them  off  a  scent !  " 

"  There 's  the  mischief  !  "  Eedworth  blew  again.  "  I  had 
no  right  to  be  championing  Mrs.  Warwick's  name.  Or 
the  world  won't  give  it,  at  all  events.  I  'm  a  blundering 
donkey.  Yes,  she  wishes  to  keep  her  liberty.  And,  upon 
my  soul,  I  'm  in  love  with  everything  she  wishes  !  I  've 
got  the  habit." 

"  Habit  be  hanged  !  "  cried  Sir  Lukin.  "You  're  in  love 
with  the  woman.  I  know  a  little  more  of  you  now,  Mr. 
Tom.  You  're  a  fellow  in  earnest  about  what  you  do. 
You  're  feeling  it  now,  on  the  rack,  by  heaven  !  though 
you  keep  a  bold  face.  Did  she  speak  positively?  —  sort 
of  feminine  of  '  you  're  the  monster,  not  the  man  ?  '  or 
measured  little  doctor's  dose  of  pity  ?  —  worse  sign ! 
You  're  not  going  ?  " 

"If  you'll  drive  me  down  in  half  an  hour,"  said 
Kedworth. 

"Give  me  an  hour,"  Sir  Lukin  replied,  and  went  straight 
to  his  wife's  blue-room. 

Diana  was  roused  from  a  meditation  on  a  letter  she  held, 
by  the  entrance  of  Emma  in  her  bed-chamber,  to  whom  she 
said :  "  I  have  here  the  very  craziest  bit  of  writing  !  —  but 
what  is  disturbing  you,  dear?" 

Emma  sat  beside  her,  panting  and  composing  her  lips  to 
speak.  "  Do  you  love  me  ?  I  throw  policy  to  the  winds, 
if  only  I  can  batter  at  you  for  your  heart  and  find  it ! 
Tony,  do  you  love  me?  But  don't  answer:  give  me  your 
hand.     You  have  rejected  him  !  " 

"  He  has  told  you  ?  " 

"No.  He  is  not  the  man  to  cry  out  for  a  wound.  He 
heard  in  London  —  Lukin  has  had  the  courage  to  tell  me, 
after  his  fashion :  —  Tom  Eedworth  heard  an  old  story, 
coming  from  one  of  the  baser  kind  of  women:  grossly 
false,  he  knew.  I  mention  only  Lord  Wroxeter  and 
Lockton.  He  went  to  man  and  woman  both,  and  had  it 
refuted,  and  stopped  their  tongues,  on  peril;  as  he  of  all 
men  is  able  to  do  when  he  wills  it," 


THE  PENULTIMATE  399 

Observing  the  quick  change  in  Tony's  eyes,  Emma 
exclaimed:  "How  you  looked  disdain  when  you  asked 
whether  he  had  told  me  !  But  why  are  you  the  handsome 
tigress  to  him,  of  all  men  living !  The  dear  fellow,  dear 
to  me  at  least !  since  the  day  he  first  saw  you,  has  wor- 
shipped you  and  striven  to  serve  you :  —  and  harder  than 
any  Scriptural  service  to  have  the  beloved  woman  to  wife. 
I  know  nothing  to  compare  with  it,  for  he  is  a  man  of 
warmth.  He  is  one  of  those  rare  men  of  honour  who  can 
command  their  passion;  who  venerate  when  they  love: 
and  those  are  the  men  that  women  select  for  punishment! 
Yes,  you  !  It  is  to  the  woman  he  loves  that  he  cannot  show 
himself  as  he  is,  because  he  is  at  her  feet.  You  have 
managed  to  stamp  your  spirit  on  him ;  and  as  a  conse- 
quence, he  defends  you  now,  for  flinging  him  off.  And 
now  his  chief  regret  is,  that  he  has  caused  his  name  to  be 
coupled  with  yours.  I  suppose  he  had  some  poor  hope, 
seeing  you  free.  Or  else  the  impulse  to  protect  the  woman 
of  his  heart  and  soul  was  too  strong.  I  have  seen  what  he 
suffered,  years  back,  at  the  news  of  your  engagement." 

"Oh,  for  God's  sake,  don't,"  cried  Touy,  tears  running 
over,  and  her  dream  of  freedom,  her  visions  of  romance, 
drowning. 

"  It  was  like  the  snapping  of  the  branch  of  an  oak,  when 
the  trunk  stands  firm,"  Emma  resumed,  in  her  desire  to 
scourge  as  well  as  to  soften.  "But  similes  applied  to  him 
will  strike  you  as  incongruous."  Tony  swayed  her  body, 
for  a  negative,  very  girlishly  and  consciously.  "  He  prob- 
ably did  not  woo  you  in  a  poetic  style,  or  the  courtly  by 
prescription."  Again  Tony  swayed;  she  had  to  hug  her- 
self under  the  stripes,  and  felt  as  if  alone  at  sea,  with  her 
dear  heavens  pelting.  "  You  have  sneered  at  him  for  his 
calculating  —  to  his  face:  and  it  was  when  he  was  compar- 
atively poor  that  he  calculated  —  to  his  cost !  —  that  he 
dared  not  ask  you  to  marry  a  man  who  could  not  offer  you 
a  tithe  of  what  he  considered  fit  for  the  peerless  woman. 
Peerless,  I  admit.  There  he  was  not  wrong.  But  if  he 
had  valued  you  half  a  grain  less,  he  might  have  won  you. 
You  talk  much  of  chivalry;  you  conceive  a  superhuman 
ideal,  to  which  you  fit  a  very  indifferent  wooden  model, 
while  the  man  of  all  the  world  the  most  chivalrous  !  .  .  . 


400  DIANA  OF  THE   CKOSSWAYS 

He  is  a  man  quite  other  from  what  you  think  him .  any- 
thing but  a  *  Cuthbert  Bering '  or  a  *  Man  of  Two  Minds.' 
He  was  in  the  drawing-room  below,  on  the  day  I  received 
your  last  maiden  letter  from  The  Crossways  —  now  his 
property,  in  the  hope  of  making  it  yours." 

"  I  behaved  abominably  there ! ''  interposed  Tony,  with 
a  gasp. 

"Let  it  pass.  At  any  rate,  that  was  the  prick  of  a 
needle,  not  the  blow  of  a  sword." 

"  But  marriage,  dear  Emmy !  marriage !  Is  marriage  to 
be  the  end  of  me?  " 

"  What  amazing  apotheosis  have  you  in  prospect  ?  And 
are  you  steering  so  particularly  well  by  yourself  ?  " 

"Miserably!  But  I  can  dream.  And  the  thought  of  a 
husband  cuts  me  from  any  dreaming.  It 's  all  dead  flat 
earth  at  once  !  " 

"  Would  you  have  rejected  him  when  you  were  a  girl  ?  " 

"I  think  so." 

"The  superior  merits  of  another?  ..." 

"  Oh,  no,  no,  no,  7io  !  I  might  have  accepted  him :  and 
I  might  not  have  made  him  happy.  I  wanted  a  hero,  and 
the  jewelled  garb  and  the  feather  did  not  suit  him." 

"  No ;  he  is  not  that  description  of  lay-figure.  You  have 
dressed  it,  and  gemmed  it,  and  —  made  your  discovery. 
Here  is  a  true  man;  and  if  you  can  find  me  any  of  your 
heroes  to  match  him,  I  will  thank  you.  He  came  on  the 
day  I  speak  of,  to  consult  me  as  to  whether,  with  the 
income  he  then  had  .  .  .  Well,  I  had  to  tell  him  you 
were  engaged.  The  man  has  never  wavered  in  his  love  of 
you  since  that  day.     He  has  had  to  bear  something." 

This  was  an  electrical  bolt  into  Tony's  bosom,  shaking 
her  from  self-pity  and  shame  to  remorseful  pity  of  the 
suffering  lover ;  and  the  tears  ran  in  streams,  as  she  said : 
"He  bore  it,  Emmy,  he  bore  it."  She  sobbed  out:  "And 
he  went  on  building  a  fortune  and  batting!  Whatever  he 
undertakes  he  does  perfectly  —  approve  of  the  pattern  or 
not.  Oh!  I  have  no  doubt  he  had  his  nest  of  wishes 
piping  to  him  all  the  while:  only  it  seems  quaint,  dear, 
quaint,  and  against  everything  we  've  been  reading  of 
lovers  !  Love  was  his  bread  and  butter  !  "  Her  dark  eyes 
showered.     "And  to  tell  you  what  you  do  not  know  of 


THE   PENULTIMATE  401 

him,  his  way  of  making  love  is  really,"  she  sobbed, 
"pretty.  It  ...  it  took  me  by  surprise;  I  was  expect- 
ing a  bellow  and  an  assault  of  horns;  and  if,  dear: — you 
will  say,  what  boarding-school  girl  have  you  got  with  you ! 
and  I  feel  myself  getting  childish:  —  if  Sol  in  his  glory 
had  not  been  so  m  .  .  .  majestically  m  .  .  .  magnificent, 
nor  seemed  to  show  me  the  king  .  .  .  kingdom  of  my 
dreams,  I  might  have  stammered  the  opposite  word  to  the 
one  he  heard.  Last  night,  when  he  took  my  hand  kindly 
before  going  to  bed,  I  had  a  fit  for  dropping  on  my  knees 
io  him.  I  saw  him  bleed,  and  he  held  himself  right 
royally.  I  told  you  he  did;  —  Sol  in  his  moral  grandeur! 
How  infinitely  above  the  physical  monarch  —  is  he  not, 
Emmy?  What  one  dislikes,  is  the  devotion  of  all  that 
grandeur  to  win  a  widow.  It  should  be  a  maiden  prin- 
cess. You  feel  it  so,  I  am  sure.  And  here  am  I,  as  if  a 
maiden  princess  were  I,  demanding  romantic  accessories 
of  rubious  vapour  in  the  man  condescending  to  implore  the 
widow  to  wed  him.  But,  tell  me,  does  he  know  every- 
thing of  his  widow  —  everything?  I  shall  not  have  to  go 
through  the  frightful  chapter?  " 

"He  is  a  man  with  his  eyes  awake;  he  knows  as  much 
as  any  husband  could  require  to  know,"  said  Emma;  add- 
ing: "My  darling!  he  trusts  you.  It  is  the  soul  of  the 
man  that  loves  you,  as  it  is  mine.  You  will  not  tease 
him  ?  Promise  me.  Give  yourself  frankly.  You  see  it 
clearly  before  you." 

"I  see  compulsion,  my  dear.  What  I  see,  is  a  regiment 
of  Proverbs,  bearing  placards  instead  of  guns,  and  each 
one  a  taunt  at  women,  especially  at  widows.  They  march; 
they  form  square;  they  enclose  me  in  the  middle,  and  I 
have  their  inscriptions  to  digest.  Eead  that  crazy  letter 
from  Mary  Paynham  while  I  am  putting  on  my  bonnet. 
I  perceive  I  have  been  crying  like  a  raw  creature  in  her 
teens.  I  don't  know  myself.  An  advantage  of  the  darker 
complexions  is  our  speedier  concealment  of  the  traces." 

Emma  read  Miss  Paynham's  letter,  and  returned  it  with 
the  comment:  "Utterly  crazy."  Tony  said:  "Is  it  not? 
I  am  to  *  Pause  before  I  trifle  with  a  noble  heart  too  long.' 
She  is  to  *  have  her  happiness  in  the  constant  prayer  for 
ours;  '  and   she   is  *  warned  by  one  of  those  intimations 

26 


402  DIANA  OF  THE  CROSS  WAYS 

never  failing  her,  that  he  runs  a  serious  danger.'  It  reads 
like  a  Wizard's  Almanack.  And  here :  *  Homogeneity  of 
sentiment  the  most  perfect,  is  unable  to  contend  with  the 
fatal  charm,  which  exercised  by  an  indifferent  person,  must 
be  ascribed  to  original  predestination.'  She  should  be 
under  the  wing  of  Lady  Wathin.  There  is  the  mother  for 
such  chicks !  But  I  '11  own  to  you,  Emmy,  that  after  the 
perusal,  I  did  ask  myself  a  question  as  to  my  likeness  of 
late  to  the  writer.  I  have  drivelled  ...  I  was  shudder- 
ing over  it  when  you  came  in.  I  have  sentimentalized  up 
to  thin  smoke.  And  she  tells  a  truth  when  she  says  I 
am  not  to  '  count  social  cleverness  '  —  she  means  volu- 
bility —  *  as  a  warrant  for  domineering  a  capacious  intelli- 
gence : '  —  because  of  the  gentleman's  modesty.  Agreed : 
I  have  done  it;  I  am  contrite.  I  am  going  into  slavery 
to  make  amends  for  presumption.  Banality,  thy  name  is 
marriage ! " 

"Your  business  is  to  accept  life  as  we  have  it,"  said 
Emma;  and  Tony  shrugged.  She  was  precipitate  in  going 
forth  to  her  commonplace  fate,  and  scarcely  looked  at  the 
man  requested  by  Emma  to  escort  her  to  her  cottage.  After 
their  departure,  Emma  fell  into  laughter  at  the  last  words 
with  the  kiss  of  her  cheeks:  **Here  goes  old  Ireland!" 
But,  from  her  look  and  from  what  she  had  said  upstairs, 
Emma  could  believe  that  the  singular  sprite  of  girlishness 
invading  and  governing  her  latterly,  had  yielded  place  to 
the  woman  she  loved. 


CHAPTER  XLIII 


NUPTIAL  CHAPTER ;   AND  OF  HOW  A  BARELY  WILLING  WOMAN 
WAS    LED    TO    BLOOM    WITH    THE    NUPTIAL    SENTIMENT 

Emma  watched  them  on  their  way  through  the  park,  till 
they  rounded  the  beechwood,  talking,  it  could  be  surmised, 
of  ordinary  matters;  the  face  of  the  gentleman  turning  at 
times  to  his  companion's,  which  steadily  fronted  the  gale. 
She  left  the  ensuing  to  a  prayer  for  their  good  direction, 
with  a  chuckle  at  Tony's  evident  feeling  of  a  ludicrous 


NUPTIAL  CHAPTER 


403 


posture,  and  the  desperate  rush  of  her  agile  limbs  to  have 
It  over.  But  her  prayer  throbbed  almost  to  a  supplication 
that  the  wrong  done  to  her  beloved  by  Dacier  — the  wound 
to  her  own  sisterly  pride  rankling  as  an  injury  to  her  sex, 
might  be  cancelled  through  the  union  of  the  woman  noble 
in  the  sight  of  God  with  a  more  manlike  man. 

Meanwhile  the  feet  of  the  couple  were  going  faster  than 
their  heads  to  the  end  of  the  journey.  Diana  knew  she 
would  have  to  hoist  the  signal  — and  how?  The  pros- 
pect was  dumbfoundering.  She  had  to  think  of  appeasing 
her  Emma.  Redworth,  for  his  part,  actually  supposed  she 
had  accepted  his  escorting  in  proof  of  the  plain  friendship 
offered  him  over-night.  ^  ,.i      ^.  •    ojj     i 

"  What  do  your  '  birds  '  do  in  weather  like  this  ?     she 

"Cling  to  their  perches  and  wait  patiently.     It'^s  the 
bad  time  with  them  when  you  don't  hear  them  chirp." 
"  Of  course  you  foretold  the  gale."  , 

"Oh,  well,  it  did  not  require  a  shepherd  or  a  skipper 

for  that."  ^  ^  ,  ^  „ 

"Your  grand  gift  will  be  useful  to  a  yachtsman. 

"You  like  yachting.  When  I  have  tried  my  new 
schooner  in  the  Channel,  she  is  at  your  ^command  for  as 
long  as  you  and  Lady  Dunstane  please." 

"  So  you  acknowledge  that  birds  —  things  of  nature  — 
have  their  bad  time? "  ,    ,  i 

"  They  profit  ultimately  by  the  deluge  and  the  wreck. 
Nothing  on  earth  is  '  tucked-up '  in  perpetuity." 

"Except  the  dead.  But  why  should  the  schooner  be  at 
our  command  ?  " 

"I  shall  be  in  Ireland." 

He  could  not  have  said  sweeter  to  her  ears  or  more 

touching.  .  ^  ,  . 

"  We  shall  hardly  feel  safe  without  the  weatherwise  on 

bonrd 

"  You  may  count  on  my  man  Barnes;  I  have  proved  him. 
He  is  up  to  his  work  even  when  he  's  bilious:  only,  in  that 
case,  occurring  about  once  a  fortnight,  you  must  leave  him 
to  fight  it  out  with  the  elements."  ^^ 

"  I  rather  like  men  of  action  to  have  a  temper. 

"I  can't  say  much  for  a  bilious  temper." 


404  DIANA  OF  THE  CKOSSWAYS 

The  weather  to-day  really  seemed  of  that  kind,  she 
remarked.  He  assented,  in  the  shrug  manner  —  not  to 
dissent:  she  might  say  what  she  would.  He  helped  no- 
where to  a  lead;  and  so  quick  are  the  changes  of  mood  at 
such  moments  that  she  was  now  far  from  him  under  the 
failure  of  an  effort  to  come  near.  But  thoughts  of  Emma 
pressed. 

"The  name  of  the  new  schooner?  Her  name  is  her 
picture  to  me." 

"I  wanted  you  to  christen  her." 

^•'Launched  without  a  name?" 

"I  took  a  liberty." 

Needless  to  ask,  but  she  did.     "With  whom?" 

"I  named  her  Diana.^^ 

"  May  the  Goddess  of  the  silver  bow  and  crescent  protect 
her !     To  me  the  name  is  ominous  of  mischance." 

"  I  would  commit  my  fortunes  and  life ! "  .  .  ,  He 
checked  his  tongue,  ejaculating:    "Omens!" 

She  had  veered  straight  away  from  her  romantic  aspi- 
rations to  the  blunt  extreme  of  thinking  that  a  widow 
should  be  wooed  in  unornamented  matter-of-fact,  as  she 
is  wedded,  with  a  "wilt  thou,"  and  "I  will,"  and  no  deco- 
rative illusions.  Downright,  for  the  unpoetic  creature, 
if  you  please!  So  she  rejected  the  accompaniment  of  the 
silver  Goddess  and  high  seas  for  an  introduction  of  the 
crisis. 

"This  would  be  a  thunderer  on  our  coasts.  I  had  a  trial 
of  my  sailing  powers  in  the  Mediterranean." 

As  she  said  it,  her  musings  on  him  then,  with  the  con- 
trast of  her  position  toward  him  now,  fierily  brushed  her 
cheeks;  and  she  wished  him  the  man  to  make  one  snatch 
at  her  poor  lost  small  butterfly  bit  of  freedom,  so  that  she 
might  suddenly  feel  in  haven,  at  peace  with  her  expectant 
Emma.  He  could  have  seen  the  inviting  consciousness, 
but  he  was  absurdly  watchful  lest  the  flying  sprays  of 
border  trees  should  strike  her.  He  mentioned  his  fear, 
and  it  became  an  excuse  for  her  seeking  protection  of  her 
veil.     "It  is  our  natural  guardian,"  she  said. 

"]!^ot  much  against  timber,"  said  he. 

The  worthy  creature's  anxiety  was  of  the  pattern  of 
cavaliers  escorting  dames  —  an  exaggeration  of  honest  zealj 


NUPTIAL  CHAPTER  405 

a  present  example  of  clownish  goodness,  it  might  seem; 
until  entering  the  larch  and  firwood  along  the  beaten 
heights,  there  was  a  rocking  and  straining  of  the  shallow - 
rooted  trees  in  a  tremendous  gust  that  quite  pardoned  him 
for  curving  his  arm  in  a  hoop  about  her  and  holding  a 
shoulder  in  front.     The  veil  did  her  positive  service. 

He  was  honourably  scrupulous  not  to  presume.  A  right 
good  unimpulsive  gentleman :  the  same  that  she  had  always 
taken  him  for  and  liked. 

"These  firs  are  not  taproots,"  he  observed,  by  way  of 
apology. 

Her  dress  volumed  and  her  ribands  rattled  and  chirruped 
on  the  verge  of  the  slope.  "I  will  take  your  arm  here," 
she  said. 

Eedworth  received  the  little  hand,  saying:  "Lean  to 
me." 

They  descended  upon  great  surges  of  wind  piping  and 
driving  every  light  surface-atom  as  foam;  and  they  blinked 
and  shook;  even  the  man  was  shaken.  But  their  arms 
were  interlinked  and  they  grappled;  the  battering  enemy 
made  them  one.  It  might  mean  nothing,  or  everything: 
to  him  it  meant  the  sheer  blissful  instant. 

At  the  foot  of  the  hill,  he  said :  "  It 's  harder  to  keep  to 
the  terms  of  yesterday." 

"What  were  they?"  said  she,  and  took  his  breath  more 
than  the  fury  of  the  storm  had  done. 

"  Raise  the  veil,  I  beg." 

"  Widows  do  not  wear  it." 

The  look  revealed  to  him  was  a  fugitive  of  the  wilds,  no 
longer  the  glittering  shooter  of  arrows. 

"  Have  you  ?  .  .  ."  changed  to  me,  was  the  signification 
understood.  "Can  you?  —  for  life!  Do  you  think  vou 
can?"  ^  ^ 

His  poverty  in  the  pleading  language  melted  her.  "  W^hat 
I  cannot  do,  my  best  of  friends,  is  to  submit  to  be  seated  on 
a  throne,  with  you  petitioning.  Yes,  as  far  as  concerns 
this  hand  of  mine,  if  you  hold  it  worthy  of  you.  We  will 
speak  of  that.  Now  tell  me  the  name  of  the  weed  trailing 
along  the  hedge  there." 

He  knew  it  well ;  a  common  hedgerow  weed ;  but  tha 
placid  diversion  baffled  him.     It  was  clematis,  he  said. 


406  DIANA   OF  THE  CROSSWAYS 

"  It  drags  in  the  dust  when  it  has  no  firm  arm  to  cling  to. 
I  passed  it  beside  you  yesterday  with  a  flaunting  mind  and 
not  a  suspicion  of  a  likeness.  How  foolish  I  was  !  I  could 
volubly  sermonize ;  only  it  should  be  a  young  maid  to  listen, 
porgive  me  the  yesterday." 

"  You  have  never  to  ask.  You  withdraw  your  hand  — 
Uras  I  rough  ?  " 

"  No,"  she  smiled  demurely ;  "  it  must  get  used  to  the 
Bhackles :  but  my  cottage  is  in  sight.  I  have  a  growing 
love  for  the  place.  We  will  enter  it  like  plain  people  —  if 
you  think  of  coming  in." 

As  she  said  it  she  had  a  slight  shock  of  cowering  under 
eyes  tolerably  hawkish  in  their  male  glitter ;  but  her  cool- 
ness was  not  disturbed,  and  without  any  apprehensions  she 
reflected  on  what  has  been  written  of  the  silly  division  and 
war  of  the  sexes :  —  which  two  might  surely  enter  on  an 
engagement  to  live  together  amiably,  unvexed  by  that 
barbarous  old  fowl  and  falcon  interlude.  Cool  herself,  she 
imagined  the  same  of  him,  having  good  grounds  for  the 
delusion ;  so  they  passed  through  the  cottage-garden  and 
beneath  the  low  porchway,  into  her  little  sitting-room, 
where  she  was  proceeding  to  speak  composedly  of  her 
preference  for  cottages,  while  untying  her  bonnet-strings  :  — 
"  If  I  had  begun  my  life  in  a  cottage  !  "  —  when  really  a 
big  storm-wave  caught  her  from  shore  and  whirled  her  to 
mid-sea,  out  of  every  sensibility  but  the  swimming  one  of 
her  loss  of  self  in  the  man. 

"  You  would  not  have  been  here !  "  was  all  he  said.  She 
was  up  at  his  heart,  fast-locked,  undergoing  a  change  greater 
than  the  sea  works;  her  thoughts  one  blush,  her  brain  a 
fire-fount.     This  was  not  like  being  seated  on  a  throne. 

"  There,"  said  he,  loosening  his  hug,  *'  now  you  belong  to 
me !  I  know  you  from  head  to  foot.  After  that,  my  darl- 
ing, I  could  leave  you  for  years,  and  call  you  wife,  and  be 
sure  of  you.  I  could  swear  it  for  you  —  my  life  on  it ! 
That 's  what  I  think  of  you.  Don't  wonder  that  I  took 
my  chance  —  the  first :  —  I  have  waited  ! " 

Truer  word  was  never  uttered,  she  owned,  coming  into 
some  harmony  with  man's  kiss  on  her  mouth  :  the  man 
violently  metamorphozed  to  a  stranger,  acting  on  rights 
Bhe  had  given  him.     And  who  was  she  to  dream  of  denying 


NUPTIAL  CHAPTER  407 

them  ?  Not  an  idea  in  her  head !  Bound  verily  to  be 
thankful  for  such  love,  on  hearing  that  it  dated  from  the 
night  in  Ireland.  ..."  So  in  love  with  you  that,  on  my 
soul,  your  happiness  was  my  marrow  —  whatever  you 
wished;  anything  you  chose.  It's  reckoned  a  fool's  part. 
No,  it 's  love  :  the  love  of  a  woman  —  the  one  woman  !  I 
was  like  the  hand  of  a  clock  to  the  springs.  I  taught  this 
old  watch-dog  of  a  heart  to  keep  guard  and  bury  the  bones 
you  tossed  him." 

"  Ignorantly,  admit,"  said  she,  and  could  have  bitten  her 
tongue  for  the  empty  words  that  provoked  :  "  Would  you 
have  flung  him  nothing  ?  "  and  caused  a  lowering  of  her 
eyelids  and  shamed  glimpses  of  recollections.  ''  I  hear  you 
have  again  been  defending  me.  I  told  you,  I  think,  I 
wished  I  had  begun  my  girl's  life  in  a  cottage.  All  that  I 
have  had  to  endure  !  ...  or  so  it  seems  to  me :  it  may  be 
my  way  of  excusing  myself  :  —  I  know  my  cunning  in  that 
peculiar  art.  I  would  take  my  chance  of  mixing  among 
the  highest  and  the  brightest." 

"  Naturally." 

"  Culpably." 

"  It  brings  you  to  me." 

"  Through  a  muddy  channel." 

"Your  husband  has  full  faith  in  you,  my  own." 

"The  faith  has  to  be  summoned  and  is  buffeted,  as  we 
were  just  now  on  the  hill.  I  wish  he  had  taken  me  from 
a  cottage." 

"  You  pushed  for  the  best  society,  like  a  fish  to  its  native 
sea." 

"  Pray  say,  a  salmon  to  the  riverheads." 

"Better,"  Kedworth  laughed  joyfully,  between  admira- 
tion of  the  tongue  that  always  outflew  him,  and  of  the  face 
he  reddened. 

By  degrees  her  apter  and  neater  terms  of  speech  helped 
her  to  a  notion  of  regaining  some  steps  of  her  sunken 
ascendancy,  under  the  weight  of  the  novel  masculine  pres- 
sure on  her  throbbing  blood ;  and  when  he  bent  to  her  to 
take  her  lord's  farewell  of  her,  after  agreeing  to  go  and 
delight  Emma  with  a  message,  her  submission  and  her 
personal  pride  were  not  so  much  at  variance :  perhaps 
because  her  buzzing  head  had  no  ideas.     "  Tell  Emma  you 


408  DIANA  OF   THE   CROSSWAYS 

have  undertaken  to  wash  the  blackamoor  as  white  as  she 
can  be,"  she  said  perversely,  in  her  spite  at  herself  for  not 
coming,  as  it  were,  out  of  the  dawn  to  the  man  she  could 
consent  to  wed :  and  he  replied  :  "  I  shall  tell  her  my  dark 
girl  pleads  for  a  fortnight's  grace  before  she  and  I  set  sail 
for  the  West  coast  of  Ireland : "  conjuring  a  picture  that 
checked  any  protest  against  the  shortness  of  time :  —  and 
Emma  would  surely  be  his  ally. 

They  talked  of  the  Dublin  Ball :  painfully  to  some  of 
her  thoughts.  But  Eedworth  kissed  that  distant  brilliant 
night  as  freshly  as  if  no  belabouring  years  rolled  in  the 
chasm:  which  led  her  to  conceive  partly,  and  wonderingly, 
the  nature  of  a  strong  man's  passion ;  and  it  subjugated 
the  woman  knowing  of  a  contrast.  The  smart  of  the  blow 
dealt  her  by  him  who  had  fired  the  passion  in  her  became  a 
burning  regret  for  the  loss  of  that  fair  fame  she  had 
sacrificed  to  him,  and  could  not  bring  to  her  truer  lover : 
though  it  was  but  the  outer  view  of  herself — the  world's 
view ;  only  she  was  generous  and  of  honest  conscience, 
and  but  for  the  sake  of  the  truer  lover,  she  would  mentally 
have  allowed  the  world  to  lash  and  abuse  her,  without  a 
plea  of  material  purity.  Could  it  be  named  ?  The  naming 
of  it  in  her  clear  mind  lessened  it  to  accidental :  —  By  good 
fortune,  she  was  no  worse !  —  She  said  to  Redworth,  when 
finally  dismissing  him  :  "  I  bring  no  real  disgrace  to  you, 
my  friend." — To  have  had  this  sharp  spiritual  battle  at 
such  a  time,  was  proof  of  honest  conscience,  rarer  among 
women,  as  the  world  has  fashioned  them  yet,  than  the 
purity  demanded  of  them.  —  His  answer :  "  You  are  my 
wife ! "  rang  in  her  hearing. 

When  she  sat  alone  at  last,  she  was  incapable,  despite 
her  nature's  imaginative  leap  to  brightness,  of  choosing  any 
single  period,  auspicious  or  luminous  or  flattering,  since 
the  hour  of  her  first  meeting  this  man,  rather  than  the 
grey  light  he  cast  on  her,  promising  helpfulness,  and  in- 
spiring a  belief  in  her  capacity  to  help.  Not  the  Salvatore 
high  raptures  nor  the  nights  of  social  applause  could  appear 
preferable :  she  strained  her  shattered  wits  to  try  them. 
As  for  her  superlunary  sphere,  it  was  in  fragments  ;  and 
she  mused  on  the  singularity,  considering  that  she  was  not 
deeply  enamoured.     Was   she   so  at  all?    The   question 


NUPTIAL  CHAPTER  409 

drove  her  to  embrace  the  dignity  of  being  reasonable  — 
under  Emma's  guidance.  For  she  did  not  stand  firmly 
alone ;  her  story  confessed  it.  Marriage  might  be  the 
archway  to  the  road  of  good  service,  even  as  our  passage 
through  the  flesh  may  lead  to  the  better  state.  She  had 
thoughts  of  the  kind,  and  had  them  while  encouraging  her- 
self to  deplore  the  adieu  to  her  little  musk-scented  sitting- 
room,  where  a  modest  freedom  breathed,  and  her  individu- 
ality had  seemed  pointing  to  a  straighter  growth. 

She  nodded  subsequently  to  the  truth  of  her  happy 
Emma's  remark  :  "You  were  created  for  the  world,  Tony.'' 
A  woman  of  blood  and  imagination  in  the  warring  world, 
without  a  mate  whom  she  can  revere,  subscribes  to  a  like- 
ness with  those  independent  minor  realms  between  greedy 
mighty  neighbours,  which  conspire  and  undermine  when 
they  do  not  openly  threaten  to  devour.  So,  then,  this 
union,  the  return  to  the  wedding  yoke,  received  sanction  of 
grey-toned  reason.  She  was  not  enamoured :  she  could 
say  it  to  herself.  She  had,  however,  been  surprised,  both 
by  the  man  and  her  unprotesting  submission ;  surprised 
and  warmed,  unaccountably  warmed.  Clearness  of  mind  in 
the  woman  chaste  by  nature,  however  little  ignorant  it  al- 
lowed her  to  be  in  the  general  review  of  herself,  could  not 
compass  the  immediately  personal,  with  its  acknowledge- 
ment of  her  subserviency  to  touch  and  pressure — and 
more,  stranger,  her  readiness  to  kindle.  She  left  it  unex- 
plained. Unconsciously  the  image  of  Dacier  was  effaced. 
Looking  backward,  her  heart  was  moved  to  her  long-constant 
lover  with  most  pitying  tender  wonderment  —  stormy  man, 
as  her  threatened  senses  told  her  that  he  was.  Looking 
at  him,  she  had  to  mask  her  being  abashed  and  mastered. 
And  looking  forward,  her  soul  fell  in  prayer  for  this  true 
man's  never  repenting  of  his  choice.  Sure  of  her  now, 
Mr.  Thomas  Redworth  had  returned  to  the  station  of  the 
courtier,  and  her  feminine  sovereignty  was  not  ruffled  to 
make  her  feel  too  feminine.  Another  revelation  was  his 
playful  talk  when  they  were  more  closely  intimate.  He 
had  his  humour  as  well  as  his  hearty  relish  of  hers. 

"If  all  Englishmen  were  like  him!"  she  chimed  with 
Emma  Dunstane's  eulogies,  under  the  influence. 

"My  dear,"  the  latter  replied,  "  we  should  simply  march 


410  DIANA  OF  THE   CEOSSWAYS 

over  the  Four  Quarters  and  be  blessed  by  the  nations ! 
Only,  avoid  your  trick  of  dashing  headlong  to  the  other 
extreme.     He  has  his  faults/' 

"  Tell  me  of  them/'  Diana  cooed  for  an  answer.  "  Do. 
I  want  the  flavour.  A  girl  would  be  satisfied  with  super- 
human excellence.     A  widow  asks  for  feature." 

"  To  my  thinking,  the  case  is,  that  if  it  is  a  widow  who 
sees  the  superhuman  excellence  in  a  man,  she  may  be  very 
well  contented  to  cross  the  bridge  with  him,"  rejoined 
Emma. 

"  Suppose  the  bridge  to  break,  and  for  her  to  fall  into  the 
water,  he  rescuing  her  —  then  perhaps  ! " 

"  But  it  has  been  happening  !  " 

"  But  piecemeal,  in  extension,  so  slowly.  I  go  to  him  a 
derelict,  bearing  a  story  of  the  sea ;  empty  of  ideas.  I  re- 
member sailing  out  of  harbour  passably  well  freighted  for 
commerce." 

"  When  Tom  Eedworth  has  had  command  of  the  ^  dere- 
lict '  a  week,  I  should  like  to  see  her  ! " 

The  mention  of  that  positive  captaincy  drowned  Diana 
in  morning  colours.  She  was  dominated,  physically  and 
morally,  submissively  too.  What  she  craved,  in  the  ab- 
sence of  the  public  whiteness  which  could  have  caused  her 
to  rejoice  in  herself  as  a  noble  gift,  was  the  spring  of  en- 
thusiasm. Emma  touched  a  quivering  chord  of  pride  with 
her  hint  at  the  good  augury,  and  foreshadowing  of  the 
larger  Union,  in  the  Irishwoman's  bestowal  of  her  hand  on 
the  open-minded  Englishman  she  had  learned  to  trust.  The 
aureole  glimmered  transiently :  she  could  neither  think 
highly  of  the  woman  about  to  be  wedded,  nor  poetically  of 
the  man ;  nor,  therefore,  rosily  of  the  ceremony,  nor  other 
than  vacuously  of  life.  And  yet,  as  she  avowed  to  Emma, 
she  had  gathered  the  three  rarest  good  things  of  life :  a 
faithful  friend,  a  faithful  lover,  a  faithful  servant :  the  two 
latter  exposing  an  unimagined  quality  of  emotion.  Dan- 
vers,  on  the  night  of  the  great  day  for  Redworth,  had  un- 
dressed her  with  trembling  fingers,  and  her  mistress  was  led 
to  the  knowledge  that  the  maid  had  always  been  all  eye ; 
and  on  reflection  to  admit  that  it  came  of  a  sympathy  she 
did  not  share. 

But  when  Celtic  brains  are  reflective  on  their  emotional 


NUPTIAL  CHAPTER  411 

vessel  they  shoot  direct  as  the  arrow  of  logic.  Diana's 
glance  at  the  years  behind  lighted  every  moving  figure  to  a 
shrewd  transparency,  herself  among  them.  She  was  driven 
to  the  conclusion  that  the  granting  of  any  of  her  heart's 
wild  wishes  in  those  days  would  have  lowered  her  —  or 
frozen.  Dacier  was  a  coldly  luminous  image ;  still  a  toll- 
ing name  ;  no  longer  conceivably  her  mate.  Eecollection 
rocked,  not  she.  The  politician  and  citizen  was  admired  : 
she  read  the  man  ;  —  more  to  her  own  discredit  than  to  his, 
but  she  read  him,  and  if  that  is  done  by  the  one  of  two 
lovers  who  was  true  to  love,  it  is  the  God  of  the  passion 
pronouncing  a  final  release  from  the  shadow  of  his  chains. 

Three  days  antecedent  to  her  marriage,  she  went  down 
the  hill  over  her  cottage  chimneys  with  Eedworth,  after 
hearing  him  praise  and  cite  to  Emma  Dunstane  sentences 
of  a  morning's  report  of  a  speech  delivered  by  Dacier  to  his 
constituents.  She  alluded  to  it,  that  she  might  air  her 
power  of  speaking  of  the  man  coolly  to  him,  or  else  for  the 
sake  of  stirring  afresh  some  sentiment  he  had  roused ;  and 
he  repeated  his  high  opinion  of  the  orator's  political  wis- 
dom :  whereby  was  revived  in  her  memory  a  certain  rep- 
rehensible view,  belonging  to  her  period  of  mock-girlish 
naughtiness  —  too  vile !  —  as  to  his  paternal  benevolence, 
now  to  clear  vision  the  loftiest  manliness.  What  did  she 
do  ?  She  was  Irish;  therefore  intuitively  decorous  in  ama- 
tory challenges  and  interchanges.  But  she  was  an  impul- 
sive woman,  and  foliage  was  thick  around,  only  a  few  small 
birds  and  heaven  seeing;  and  penitence  and  admiration 
sprang  the  impulse.  It  had  to  be  this  or  a  burst  of  weep- 
ing :  —  she  put  a  kiss  upon  his  arm. 

She  had  omitted  to  think  that  she  was  dealing  with  a 
lover  a  man  of  smothered  fire,  who  would  be  electrically 
alive  to  the  act  through  a  coat-sleeve.  Kedworth  had  his 
impulse.  He  kept  it  under,  —  she  felt  the  big  breath  he 
drew  in.  Imagination  began  busily  building  a  nest  for 
him,  and  enthusiasm  was  not  sluggish  to  make  a  home  of 
it.  The  impulse  of  each  had  wedded ;  in  expression  and 
repression ;  her  sensibility  told  her  of  the  stronger. 

She  rose  on  the  morning  of  her  marriage  day  with  his 
favourite  Planxty  Kelly  at  her  lips,  a  natural  bubble  of  the 
notes.     Emma  drove  down  to  the  cottasre  to  breakfast  and 


412  DIANA   OF   THE   CEOSSWAYS 

superintend  her  bride's  adornment,  as  to  which,  Diana  had 
spoken  slightingly;  as  well  as  of  the  ceremony,  and  the 
institution,  and  this  life  itself :  —  she  would  be  married 
out  of  her  cottage,  a  widow,  a  cottager,  a  woman  under  a 
cloud ;  yes,  a  sober  person  taking  at  last  a  right  practical 
step,  to  please  her  two  best  friends.  The  change  was 
marked.  She  wished  to  hide  it,  wished  to  conlide  it. 
Emma  was  asked  :  "  How  is  he  this  morning  ?  "  and  at  the 
answer,  describing  his  fresh  and  spirited  looks,  and  his 
kind  ways  with  Arthur  Ehodes,  and  his  fun  with  Sullivan 
Smith,  and  the  satisfaction  with  the  bridegroom  declared 
by  Lord  Larrian  (invalided  from  his  Rock  and  unexpect- 
ingly  informed  of  the  wedding),  Diana  forgot  that  she  had 
kissed  her,  and  this  time  pressed  her  lips,  in  a  manner  to 
convey  the  secret  bridally. 

"  He  has  a  lovely  day." 

"  And  bride,"  said  Emma. 

**  If  you  two  think  so  !  I  should  like  to  agree  with  my 
dear  old  lord  and  bless  him  for  the  prize  he  takes,  though 
it  feels  itself  at  present  rather  like  a  Christmas  bon-bon  — 
a  piece  of  sugar  in  the  wrap  of  a  rhymed  motto.  He  is  kind 
to  Arthur,  you  say  ?  " 

"  Like  a  cordial  elder  brother.'* 

"  Dear  love,  I  have  it  at  heart  that  I  was  harsh  upon 
Mary  Paynham  for  her  letter.  She  meant  well  —  and  I 
fear  she  suffers.  And  it  may  have  been  a  bit  my  fault. 
Blind  that  I  was!  When  you  say  'cordial  elder  brother,^ 
you  make  him  appear  beautiful  to  me.  The  worst  of  that 
is,  one  becomes  aware  of  the  inability  to  match  him." 

"  Read  with  his  eyes  when  you  meet  him  this  morning, 
my  Tony." 

The  secret  was  being  clearly  perceived  by  Emma,  whose 
pride  in  assisting  to  dress  the  beautiful  creature  for  her 
inarriage  with  the  man  of  men  had  a  tinge  from  the  hy- 
m  enseal  brand,  exulting  over  Dacier,  and  in  the  compensa- 
tion coming  to  her  beloved  for  her  first  luckless  footing  on 
this  road. 

"  How  does  he  go  down  to  the  church  ?  "  said  Diana. 

"  He  walks  down.  Lukin  and  his  Chief  drive.  He 
walks,  with  your  Arthur  and  Mr.  Sullivan  Smith.  He  is 
on  his  way  now." 


NUPTIAL  CHAPTER  413 

Diana  looked  througli  the  window  in  the  direction  of  the 
hill.     "  That  is  so  like  him,  to  walk  to  his  wedding ! " 

Emma  took  the  place  of  Danvers  in  the  office  of  the 
robing,  for  the  maid,  as  her  mistress  managed  to  hint,  was 
too  steeped  "  in  the  colour  of  the  occasion  "  to  be  exactly 
tasteful,  and  had  the  art,  no  doubt  through  sympathy,  of 
charging  permissible  common  words  with  explosive  mean- 
ings :  —  she  was  in  an  amorous  palpitation,  of  the  reflected 
state.  After  several  knockings  and  enterings  of  the  bed- 
chamber-door, she  came  hurriedly  to  say :  '  *  And  your 
pillow,  ma'am  ?  I  had  almost  forgotten  it !  "  A  question 
that  caused  her  mistress  to  drop  the  gaze  of  a  moan  on 
Emma,  with  patience  trembling.  Diana  preferred  a  hard 
pillow,  and  usually  carried  her  own  about.  "  Take  it,"  she 
had  to  reply. 

The  friends  embraced  before  descending  to  step  into  the 
fateful  carriage.  "And  tell  me,"  Emma  said,  "are  not 
your  views  of  life  brighter  to-day  ?  " 

"  Too  dazzled  to  know  !  It  may  be  a  lamp  close  to  the 
eyes  or  a  radiance  of  sun.     I  hope  they  are." 

"  You  are  beginning  to  think  hopefully  again  ?  " 

"  Who  can  really  think  and  not  think  hopefully  ?  You 
were  in  my  mind  last  night,  and  you  brought  a  little  boat 
to  sail  me  past  despondency  of  life  and  the  fear  of  extinc- 
tion. When  we  despair  or  discolour  things,  it  is  our  senses 
in  revolt,  and  they  have  made  the  sovereign  brain  their 
drudge.  I  heard  you  whisper,  with  your  very  breath  in  my 
ear  :  '  There  is  nothing  the  body  suffers  that  the  soul  may  not 
profit  hy.^  That  is  Emma's  history.  With  that  I  sail  into 
the  dark ;  it  is  my  promise  of  the  immortal :  teaches  me  to 
see  immortality  for  us.     It  comes  from  you,  my  Emm}'-." 

If  not  a  great  saying,  it  was  in  the  heart  of  deep  thoughts : 
proof  to  Emma  that  her  Tony's  mind  had  resumed  its  old 
clear  high-aiming  activity ;  therefore  that  her  nature  was 
working  sanely,  and  that  she  accepted  her  happiness,  and 
bore  love  for  a  dower  to  her  husband.  No  blushing  con- 
fession of  the  woman's  love  of  the  man  would  have  told  her 
so  much  as  the  return  to  mental  harmony  with  the  laws  of 
life  shown  in  her  darling's  pellucid  little  sentence. 

She  revolved  it  long  after  the  day  of  the  wedding.  To 
Emma,  constantly  on  the  dark  decline  of  the  unillumined 


414  DIANA   OF   THE   CROSSWAYS 

verge,  between  the  two  worlds,  those  words  were  a  radiance 
and  a  nourishment.  Had  they  waned  she  would  have 
trimmed  them  to  feed  her  during  her  soul-sister's  absence. 
They  shone  to  her  of  their  vitality.  She  was  lying  along 
her  sofa,  facing  her  South-western  window,  one  afternoon 
of  late  November,  expecting  Tony  from  her  lengthened 
honeymoon  trip,  while  a  sunset  in  the  van  of  frost,  not  with- 
out celestial  musical  reminders  of  Tony's  husband,  began  to 
deepen;  and  as  her  friend  was  coming,  she  mused  on  the 
scenes  of  her  friend's  departure,  and  how  Tony,  issuing  from 
her  cottage  porch,  had  betrayed  her  feelings  in  the  language 
of  her  sex  by  stooping  to  lift  above  her  head  and  kiss  the 
smallest  of  her  landlady's  children  ranged  up  the  garden- 
path  to  bid  her  farewell  over  their  strewing  of  flowers ;  — 
and  of  her  murmur  to  Tony,  entering  the  churchyard, 
among  the  grave-mounds:  "Old  Ireland  won't  repent  it!" 
and  Tony's  rejoinder,  at  the  sight  of  the  bridegroom  advanc- 
ing, beaming  :  "  A  singular  transformation  of  Old  England !  " 
—  and  how,  having  numberless  ready  sources  of  laughter 
and  tears  down  the  run  of  their  heart-in-heart  intimacy,  all 
spouting  up  for  a  word  in  the  happy  tremour  of  the  moment, 
they  had  both  bitten  their  lips  and  blinked  on  a  moisture  of 
the  eyelids.  Now  the  dear  woman  was  really  wedded, 
wedded  and  mated.  Her  letters  breathed,  in  their  own 
lively  or  thoughtful  flow,  of  the  perfect  mating.  Emma 
gazed  into  the  depths  of  the  waves  of  crimson,  where 
brilliancy  of  colour  came  out  of  central  heaven  preter- 
naturally  near  on  earth,  till  one  shade  less  brilliant  seemed 
an  ebbing  away  to  boundless  remoteness.  Angelical  and 
mortal  mixed,  making  the  glory  overhead  a  sign  of  the  close 
union  of  our  human  conditions  with  the  ethereal  and 
psychically  divined.  Thence  it  grew  that  one  thought  in  her 
breast  became  a  desire  for  such  extension  of  days  as  would 
give  her  the  blessedness  to  clasp  in  her  lap  —  if  those  kind 
heavens  would  grant  it!  —  a  child  of  the  marriage  of  the 
two  noblest  of  human  souls,  one  the  dearest ;  and  so  have 
proof  at  heart  that  her  country  and  our  earth  are  fruitful  in 
the  good,  for  a  glowing  future.  She  was  deeply  a  woman, 
dumbly  a  poet.  True  poets  and  true  women  have  the  native 
sense  of  the  divineness  of  what  the  world  deems  gross 
material  substance.     Emma's  exaltation  in  fervour  had  not 


NUPTIAL  CHAPTER  415 

subsided  when  she  held  her  beloved  in  her  arms  under  the 
dusk  of  the  withdrawing  redness.  They  sat  embraced,  with 
hands  locked,  in  the  unlighted  room,  and  Tony  spoke  of  the 
splendid  sky.  "  You  watched  it  knowing  I  was  on  my  way 
to  you  ?  " 

"  Praying,  dear.'' 

"For  me?" 

"  That  I  might  live  long  enough  to  be  a  godmother." 

There  was  no  reply :  there  was  an  involuntary  little 
twitch  of  Tony's  fingers. 


THE  END. 


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